Technology in psychology: a bibliometric analysis of technology-based interventions in clinical and health psychology

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to identify, synthesize, and evaluate the current state of research on the use of technology-based interventions in clinical psychology through 2017 as a recent innovative area of study. It was intended to provide a critical overview of trends in different tools and populations and identify future areas of interest. This paper focuses on studies published in psychological interventions in childhood, adolescents, adults, and geriatric populations using new technologies, including web-based intervention, virtual reality, augmented reality, mobile applications, and robotics, with particular attention to methodology. To achieve this aim, a systematic search was made in the ISI Web of Science for intervention, psychology, and the technological tools previously mentioned. The results of the study show that the use of information and communication technologies in psychology has been an innovative and growing field of study for the last 10 years. In total, 743 were included in this study. A growing trend has been observed in publications related to psychology and the use of technologies since 2007. Resea0rch topics were focused mainly on interventions on specific problems or disorders such as depression. The largest number of publications were found for the web-based intervention, in randomized clinical trials and applied to adults

KEYWORDS:

• Bibliometric
• clinical psychology
• health psychology
• information and communication technologies
• scientometric

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work is supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation PID2019-110036RB-100 (Project reference/AEI/10.13039/501100011033) awarded to I.G. The present study has been carried out thanks to a postdoctoral grant of the “Plan Propio de Investigacion” of the University of Almeria, from which the first author is a beneficiary.