Could a virtual therapist improve YOUR life?

By Louise Chunn

Last updated at 9:09 PM on 27th November 2011

Online support: But can emailing a therapist beat face-to-face contact? (posed by model)

We now spend more time online than we do asleep, according to a news story last week.

We store our music online, download and read books on a Kindle or tablet and chat to our friends on Skype. And the latest thing to move into the virtual world is therapy.

In the U.S., e-therapy is predicted to be about to take off ‘like a rocket’, while British therapists expect to see more of it.

You can turn on your computer and Skype your therapist, meet them in Second Life, an online virtual world, or have e-therapy by email — where patients write to the therapist and then, at an agreed time, the therapist will reply. This gives them a record of the conversation, which can be referred to.

But can e-therapy really measure up to face-to-face contact? Dr Kate Anthony, joint CEO of Online Therapy Insitute, trains psychotherapists in using technology, and thinks there is nothing important lost in the move from actual to virtual. 

‘The benefits to clients, when done ethically and responsibly, outweigh the negatives,’ she says.

And online therapy can have quicker results, it’s claimed. ‘You might need 12 sessions of face-to-face to deal with an issue, but you can get to the same place in five email sessions,’ says Dr Anthony.

It’s often cheaper, and there is evidence some conditions may be well suited to it, such as agorophobia, anxiety, depression and OCD.

But not all therapists are in favour. Lacanian psychoanalyst Anouchka Grose, author of Are You Considering Therapy and No More Silly Love Songs: A Realist’s Guide to Romance, says: ‘Therapy is to help you deal with real stuff, so I think the session should be real, too.’

Therapy is largely unregulated. There are associations such as the British Association for Counselling and Therapy, for which Dr Anthony writes guidelines for ethical online practice, but not everyone seeks out the bona fide professionals.

A cartoon in a recent Scientific American Mind recalls a joke in which one dog is talking to another while typing on a keyboard. The caption reads: ‘On the internet nobody knows you’re a dog’.

The lesson if you’re considering e-therapy? Do your homework.

Louise Chunn is Editor of Psychologies magazine