The Past and Present of Teletherapy

<p>In this episode, Julia Sizek, a Phd candidate in the UC Berkeley Department of Anthropology, interviews scholars <span style= "font-weight: 400;">Hannah Zeavin</span> <span style= "font-weight: 400;">and Valerie Black about teletherapy, which describes all forms of remote therapy, from letter-writing to chatbots. Both of these UC Berkeley researchers study the history and experience of these tools of therapy, which are often assumed to be more impersonal than and inferior to forms of in-person therapy, but which have seen a surge during the pandemic. They discuss the past and present of teletherapy, how the ongoing pandemic has affected mental health care, and the business of artificial intelligence-based therapy. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href= "https://www.linkedin.com/in/valerie-black-4b1699167/" target= "_blank" rel="noopener">Valerie Black</a> is a PhD Candidate in anthropology at Berkeley completing her dissertation, “Dehumanizing Care: An Ethnography of Mental Health Artificial Intelligence.” Her multisited dissertation research has been conducted in Silicon Valley at a mental health chatbot company and in Japan at a mental health videogame company. Her research concerns how chatbots and other AI health might reshape our understanding of care and labor. She was recently awarded the <a href= "https://grad.berkeley.edu/news/profiles/anthropology-ph-d-student-valerie-black-awarded-prestigious-newcombe-fellowship/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship</a> to complete her work on her dissertation. </span></p> <p><br /> <span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="https://www.zeavin.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Hannah Zeavin</a> is a Lecturer in the Departments of English and History at Berkeley, and sits on the Executive Committee for the Berkeley Center for New Media.she received her PhD from NYU’s Department of Media, Culture, and Communication in 2018. Her research considers the role of technology in American life. Her book (2021