Full Text

Turn on search term navigation

© 2022 Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2022. Re-use permitted under CC BY. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See:  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Background

Advances in genetics and digital phenotyping in psychiatry have given rise to testing services targeting young people, which claim to predict psychiatric outcomes before difficulties emerge. These services raise several ethical challenges surrounding data sharing and information privacy.

Objectives

This study aimed to investigate young people’s interest in predictive testing for mental health challenges and their attitudes towards sharing biological, psychosocial and digital data for such purpose.

Methods

Eighty UK adolescents aged 16–18 years took part in a digital role-play where they played the role of clients of a fictional predictive psychiatry company and chose what sources of personal data they wished to provide for a risk assessment. After the role-play, participants reflected on their choices during a peer-led interview.

Findings

Participants saw multiple benefits in predictive testing services, but were highly selective with regard to the type of data they were willing to share. Largely due to privacy concerns, digital data sources such as social media or Google search history were less likely to be shared than psychosocial and biological data, including school grades and one’s DNA. Participants were particularly reluctant to share social media data with schools (but less so with health systems).

Conclusions

Emerging predictive psychiatric services are valued by young people; however, these services must consider privacy versus utility trade-offs from the perspective of different stakeholders, including adolescents.

Clinical implications

Respecting adolescents’ need for transparency, privacy and choice in the age of digital phenotyping is critical to the responsible implementation of predictive psychiatric services.

Details

Title
Data sharing in the age of predictive psychiatry: an adolescent perspective
Author
Pavarini, Gabriela 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Yosifova, Aleksandra 2 ; Wang, Keying 3 ; Wilcox, Benjamin 4 ; Tomat, Nastja 5 ; Lorimer, Jessica 6 ; Kariyawasam, Lasara 7 ; Leya, George 8 ; Alí, Sonia 9 ; Singh, Ilina 6 

 Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK; Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities, University of Oxford, Oxford, Oxfordshire, UK; Ethox Centre, Department of Population Health, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK 
 Department of Cognitive Science and Psychology, New Bulgarian University, Sofia, Bulgaria 
 Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, London, UK 
 Department of Neuroscience, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK 
 Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia 
 Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK; Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities, University of Oxford, Oxford, Oxfordshire, UK 
 Department of Psychology, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK 
 Division of Psychology & Language Sciences, University College London, London, UK 
 Department of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK 
Pages
69-76
Section
Ethics
Publication year
2022
Publication date
May 2022
Publisher
BMJ Publishing Group LTD
ISSN
13620347
e-ISSN
1468960X
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2656879271
Copyright
© 2022 Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2022. Re-use permitted under CC BY. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See:  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.