Exploring the Effects of Technological Writing Assistance for Support Providers in Online Mental Health Community

Textual comments from peers with informational and emotional support are beneficial to members of online mental health communities (OMHCs). However, many comments are not of high quality in reality. Writing support technologies that assess (AS) the text or recommend (RE) writing examples on the fly could potentially help support providers to improve the quality of their comments. However, how providers perceive and work with such technologies are under-investigated. In this paper, we present a technological prototype MepsBot which offers providers in-situ writing assistance in either AS or RE mode. Results of a mixed-design study with 30 participants show that both types of MepsBots improve users' confidence in and satisfaction with their comments. The AS-mode MepsBot encourages users to refine expressions and is deemed easier to use, while the RE-mode one stimulates more support-related content re-editions. We report concerns on MepsBot and propose design considerations for writing support technologies in OMHCs.