Experience sampling methodology in mental health research

Tuesday 8 October 2024 at 3-4pm.

The talk will be held in Meeting Room 7 in Maple House 6^th Floor Wing B or you can join online via Zoom.

Title: Out of the lab and into daily life: Using the experience sampling method to understand suicidal thoughts and behaviours

Abstract:  Suicidal thoughts and behaviours are dynamic, varying over minutes and hours. Capturing these rapidly fluctuating phenomena requires dynamic methods, including the experience sampling method (ESM), a structured electronic diary technique whereby participants answer multiple brief questionnaires per day for days or weeks about their feelings, behaviours, and context.  These data provide us with unique insights into suicidal thoughts and behaviours in individuals’ daily lives, laying the foundation for digital interventions that can be delivered in daily life, when individuals need them the most. In this talk, I will present results from a series of ESM studies on self-harm and suicidal thoughts and behaviours in adolescents and young adults, and will go on to discuss a new research programme focusing on identifying novel protective factors for suicidal thoughts and behaviours.

Bio:  Olivia Kirtley is an Assistant Research Professor and Co-Director of the Center for Contextual Psychiatry (CCP), KU Leuven, Belgium. Her research uses an electronic diary technique called the experience sampling method (ESM) to investigate dynamic daily-life processes involved in suicidal thoughts and behaviours among young adults, with a focus on social processes, future thinking, and exposure to suicidal behaviour. As well as leading research on suicide and self-harm at the CCP, she co-leads the CCP research line on ESM methodology, statistics, and meta- science, where she is working to increase transparency and reproducibility in suicide, clinical psychology, and ESM research, including by co-designing the pre- registration template for experience sampling studies and leading the Experience Sampling Method Item Repository (www.esmitemrepository.com). Olivia is also an Open Science Advisor and Consulting Editor for Clinical Psychological Science, Associate Editor for Archives of Suicide Research, and a board member of the International Academy of Suicide Research.