Would you take advice from a robot?

The article that I found for my IT blog is entitled “NASA Building Robot Psychiatrist for Depressed Astronauts” and is located on the foxnews.com website. This article is about how currently NASA is working on a technological program to help depressed astronauts while out on space missions. Not only does being in space affect a person’s natural sleep and eating cycles, it takes them away from their families for long periods of time and surrounds them by the same few people every day. These changes often make astronauts depressed and moody while they are out on their missions. Often times the depression makes crewmembers distraught, or it can even cause arguments between people on the shuttles. NASA knows that this has been a problem on numerous occasions, so they decided to make an electronic therapist who helps the astronauts identify the reasons for their depression and how they can help themselves. The way they do this is by using a recorded video therapist who talks about problems that are specific to these space missions.

So how does this relate to IT? NASA is using an information system to try to psychologically help their astronauts and by doing so, making their own missions more successful. Though NASA is very optimistic, I have mixed opinions about this program. I think that it is a nice thought to try to help these astronauts when it is simple to identify their problems. Also, it makes sense that they would feel this way, so to make them feel less alone through the process, I think it is nice to help them out through their missions. I would never have thought that there would be emotional issues on a space mission, but now that the problems have been identified, I understand how astronauts would have trouble on these missions. The makers of this program also think that not only can their program help astronauts in space, but that it may also help earthly people who may not have the money for a therapist or who refuse to see someone because of pride issues.

The things that I do not agree with about this program are the fact that personal contact is taken away from the experience and the fact that there is no way that these pre-recorded psychiatrists can have all of the appropriate responses to each individual’s problems. Without the personal contact of a therapist, how can someone get much relief from their depression? Talking to a robotic imitation of a person would not make me feel any less depressed. It might actually make me feel more depressed because then I would feel even more isolated if the only thing I could relate to was a computer screen. Also, you can only prerecord so many answers to so many questions. Every individual will have their own specific and special problems, so the answers provided may not always help them. Lastly, in extreme cases, computers cannot prescribe anti-depression medications. I think that there are a lot of things to think about when it comes to this new program. Will this make an astronaut feel more comfortable? Or will it only make them feel more isolated?

this article was found at the following website: 

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,444249,00.html?sPage=fnc/health/mentalhealth