RESUMO
Digital Mental Health Technologies (DMHTs) have the potential to close treatment gaps in settings where mental healthcare is scarce or even inaccessible. For this, DMHTs need to be affordable, evidence-based, justice-oriented, user-friendly, and embedded in a functioning digital infrastructure. This viewpoint discusses areas crucial for future developments of DMHTs. Drawing back on interdisciplinary scholarship, questions of health equity, consumer-, patient- and developer-oriented legislation, and requirements for successful implementation of technologies across the globe are discussed. Economic considerations and policy implications complement these aspects. We discuss the need for cultural adaptation specific to the context of use and point to several benefits as well as pitfalls of DMHTs for research and healthcare provision. Nonetheless, to circumvent technology-driven solutionism, the development and implementation of DMHTs require a holistic, multi-sectoral, and participatory approach.
RESUMO
Evolutionary, cognitive, and neural underpinnings of mammalian play are not yet fully elucidated. We played hide-and-seek, an elaborate role-play game, with rats. We did not offer food rewards but engaged in playful interactions after finding or being found. Rats quickly learned the game and learned to alternate between hiding versus seeking roles. They guided seeking by vision and memories of past hiding locations and emitted game event-specific vocalizations. When hiding, rats vocalized infrequently and they preferred opaque over transparent hiding enclosures, a preference not observed during seeking. Neuronal recordings revealed intense prefrontal cortex activity that varied with game events and trial types ("hide" versus "seek") and might instruct role play. The elaborate cognitive capacities for hide-and-seek in rats suggest that this game might be evolutionarily old.