The aim of this research program is to develop and pilot bilingual telephone-assisted computerized speech recognition methods for screening depression in English and Spanish speaking populations. A computerized speech recognition program administers a discrete choice questionnaire by presenting an item, recognizing a spoken response, and scoring the response. The goal is to ascertain if culturally appropriate bilingual """"""""talking"""""""" and speech responsive computerized applications provide suitable and accurate health care screening alternatives to conventional methods. Although this venture may be perceived as controversial, the intent of developing voice activated computerized screening is not to replace personnel, but to provide ancillary assessment services in the absence or unavailability of bilingual mental health care staff. These computerized tools can extend mental health services by providing an adjunct for verbally screening more individuals who would otherwise continue to suffer debilitating depressive screening more individual who would otherwise continue to suffer debilitating depressive disorders. In addition, computerized screening can generate access for individuals not likely to utilize such as non-literate or non-English-speaking persons, because of standard English language paper-and-pencil assessment methods. The advantages of a telephone assisted interview include: employing a familiar communication interface, reducing anxiety by removing a visible computer terminal, and providing portability for interviewing. The application focuses on conducting two internally and externally valid exploratory studies designs for evaluating the computer-telephone methods. The pilot studies will employ counterbalanced designs for randomly ordering the depression screening methods using a 2-3 week test-retest sequence to access the accuracy of the methods for detecting depression symptom levels among depressed and nondepressed individuals for the two language group. Ultimately, reliable and valid telephone assisted computerized speech recognition screening methods may increase the accurate detection of cases with high depressive symptoms and provide access to appropriate prevention or treatment, consequently, reducing unnecessary health care practices and costs associated with the misdiagnoses and mistreatment of clinical depression.
