Table of ContentsView AllTable of ContentsSigning UpHow Woebot WorksDid It Help Me?Pros and ConsFinal Thoughts
Table of ContentsView All
View All
Table of Contents
Signing Up
How Woebot Works
Did It Help Me?
Pros and Cons
Final Thoughts
Butcan AI cross over into the mental health arena, too? Can an AI-based app provide meaningful support if you’re coping with symptoms of anxiety or depression, struggling with negative thoughts, fighting feelings of stress or loneliness, or having difficulty navigating relationships?
Woebot Healthwants you to think so, which is why it’s created the cute little cartoon robot avatar called “Woebot.” Combining psychology research with AI technology, Woebot “talks” to you through a messaging app about what you’re experiencing, then uses proven therapeutic strategies based incognitive behavioral therapy(CBT) to engage, educate, and assist you with whatever issues you share with your new robot friend.
As someone who has been diagnosed withanxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), I was curious to see if Woebot could help me push through some of the negative thought patterns and anxious feelings I often have on a daily basis. While I have a great therapist, the work that gets done in-office is long-range; I wondered if Woebot could assist with in-the-moment stressors, and remind me how to actually use all the coping mechanisms I’ve learned over my years in therapy. To find out, I chatted with Woebot several times per week for 30 days.
Turns out, although some aspects of the app were very helpful and engaging in the moment, I ultimately didn’t feel like the experience of using Woebot was useful in my everyday life—so it’s fair to say I’ll be sticking with a human therapist for now. Here’s how using Woebot went for me.
How I Signed Up for Woebot
I was pleasantly surprised that the full app was free and available for both iOS and Android users, making it accessible to literally anyone with a smartphone. (However, I did note in the FAQs that it may not always be free in order to establish “a sustainable business,”which I thought was an interesting thing to admit.) Woebot Health also says it designed the app for young adults, but everyone from teens to older adults can use it.
Wait times to see a mental health professional are long, Woebot Health informs us, but the Woebot app is ready to assist as soon as it’s downloaded—and admittedly, this is true. As soon as I downloaded it, I was able to jump right into the conversation.
Woebot is what’s called an “automated conversational agent” or “chatbot.” When I opened the app, I could start a conversation with Woebot about my day or go straight to the topics section and complete one of its built-in educational modules.
Verywell Mind
If I chose to use one of its modules, I could choose among broad categories like relationships, self-care and self-image, stress and change, and achieving goals. Each category has about 10 modules requiring around five minutes of conversation with Woebot. A typical module might start out with Woebot asking me a question or talking about a challenging situation, and then coaching me through the process of identifying problematic thought patterns or behaviors, relating hypothetical scenarios to my real-life experiences, or making plans for coping with similar challenges in the future.
For example, one module I liked was about the difference between anxiety and worry; Woebot said something like “I went on a trip recently and was worried about getting to the airport on time” and then, over the course of a few minutes, introduced the concept of anxiety versus worry, quizzed me on the difference, and asked me to write my own responses to some questions.
I appreciated how clearly Woebot outlined anxiety versus worry using concrete examples.
And although I basically already knew the difference, it was good to get a reminder (and any user who was learning this for the first time would have probably benefited from Woebot’s clear and concise explanation).
I liked that Woebot gave me a lot of agency; it always asked me if Iwantedto chat about specific topics, giving me scripted responses to choose from, like “Sure,” “Not now,” or “Maybe later.” I also liked that I could set my own pace—I could check in as often as I wanted and spend as much time as I felt like in the app. About every five minutes (or in between topics of conversation), Woebot would ask me if I wanted to keep going, try something else, or be done for the time being.
Personally, I found the modules to be more helpful than the daily check-ins.
Woebot Health wants to present its app as equally as helpful as therapy, but it often can’t compare. Once, I opened up the app to check in with Woebot after having a frustrating morning with my son, and there was simply no way to express that to Woebot accurately, or truly hone in on the complex emotions I was having. I ended up closing the app and feeling annoyed that Woebot couldn’t help me process those emotions the way I thought it could. As someone who’s been through years of therapy, there is a huge difference in being able to sit down with a person and say, “I’ve had a really tough day and I don’t even know where to start,” and opening up an app to choose a pre-selected statement like “I’m feeling low.”
For all the educational value the Woebot app offers, I found that I never really thought about the app when I was away from my device.
Even when things got stressful in my real life, Woebot wasn’t a coping strategy I considered using.
I checked in more out of obligation, and often found that even the modules—which were more useful for me than the spontaneous chats—only scratched the surface of what they were trying to address. I can’t say I learned anything new; I reviewed concepts I’ve already learned about in therapy, and that was sometimes helpful, but nothing in the app was useful enough to keep me coming back for more.
About Woebot’s Limitations
“Because AI can only function based on information it’s been fed and taught from outside sources, an AI psychiatry service is, at this moment, a terrifying thought,” subject matter expertHannah Owens, LMSW, told me when I asked her about this. “Unlike AI, a psychiatrist can read their patient in the moment and respond not just to what they say, but also their nonverbal communication like body language—and do it all based on new information personalized to their client. No one should be prescribing medication based only on a conversation with an AI bot.”
Amy Marschall, PsyD and clinical psychologist agrees.
“I would strongly caution people against using AI to replace providers as it poses serious safety concerns—for example, earlier this year,a man died from suicideafter having ‘sessions’ with an AI ‘therapist,’” explains Marschall. “I think there can be benefits to using AI to connect people with resources or walking them through coping skills techniques, but the technology doesn’t seem able to replicate a therapeutic relationship and presents a major liability due to safety concerns.”
Woebot was a convenient, bite-sized way to grow my own therapy skills at home, offering the chance to see how my brain processes challenging emotions and improve my responses to those emotions. But for people like me, who have already done a lot of that work in traditional therapy, Woebot felt superficial and underwhelming (and, at times, even frustrating to rely on).
ProsFree and easy to downloadI could gain information in short, focused sessionsI never felt like I was “doing therapy”Woebot is appropriate for many agesI could check in for timely support or learn through modulesConsCan’t replace therapy or provide long-term treatmentI never thought about checking in with Woebot when I was stressed or anxiousMy responses had to fit into pre-scripted “boxes”I was frustrated when Woebot couldn’t figure out what I neededIt wasn’t the same as talking to an actual personThe beginner-level information was redundant and boring
ProsFree and easy to downloadI could gain information in short, focused sessionsI never felt like I was “doing therapy”Woebot is appropriate for many agesI could check in for timely support or learn through modules
Free and easy to download
I could gain information in short, focused sessions
I never felt like I was “doing therapy”
Woebot is appropriate for many ages
I could check in for timely support or learn through modules
ConsCan’t replace therapy or provide long-term treatmentI never thought about checking in with Woebot when I was stressed or anxiousMy responses had to fit into pre-scripted “boxes”I was frustrated when Woebot couldn’t figure out what I neededIt wasn’t the same as talking to an actual personThe beginner-level information was redundant and boring
Can’t replace therapy or provide long-term treatment
I never thought about checking in with Woebot when I was stressed or anxious
My responses had to fit into pre-scripted “boxes”
I was frustrated when Woebot couldn’t figure out what I needed
It wasn’t the same as talking to an actual person
The beginner-level information was redundant and boring
If you’ve never done any kind of therapy and are struggling with unhealthy or unproductive thought patterns or behaviors to things like stress, anxiety, ordepression, Woebot is a good beginner’s training tool. I could set my own learning pace, engage with Woebot however I wanted, and trust that the app was tracking my progress over time and using my responses to get to know me—and my issues—a little bit better.
But to be honest, I expected an AI therapist like Woebot to be more sophisticated in how it conversed with me.
I do think the modules are potentially helpful, even if it’s just in reviewing common and often sticky emotional concepts (like letting go of guilt and identifyingcognitive distortions).
I’m not sure the modules alone are worth downloading Woebot for, though, since I never felt inspired to open the app and complete a module just for fun.
I might recommend Woebot to someone with limited mental health concerns (like feeling mildly anxious, stuck, or depressed) who has little to no existing knowledge of therapeutic approaches, but it’s probably not worth the download if you have ever been or currently go to traditional therapy.
4 SourcesVerywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Biever C.ChatGPT broke the Turing test — the race is on for new ways to assess AI.Nature.Woebot Health.FAQ.American Psychological Association.What is cognitive behavioral therapy?.Woebot Health.What powers Woebot.
4 Sources
Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Biever C.ChatGPT broke the Turing test — the race is on for new ways to assess AI.Nature.Woebot Health.FAQ.American Psychological Association.What is cognitive behavioral therapy?.Woebot Health.What powers Woebot.
Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
Biever C.ChatGPT broke the Turing test — the race is on for new ways to assess AI.Nature.Woebot Health.FAQ.American Psychological Association.What is cognitive behavioral therapy?.Woebot Health.What powers Woebot.
Biever C.ChatGPT broke the Turing test — the race is on for new ways to assess AI.Nature.
Woebot Health.FAQ.
American Psychological Association.What is cognitive behavioral therapy?.
Woebot Health.What powers Woebot.
Hannah Owens, LMSW
andSimone Scully
Simone Scully
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