Feeling stressed? Take a digital mental health vitamin

Research shows the power of AI to develop resilience to day-to-day stressors  A new AI powered app called Joyi can improve users' mood by increasing positive emotions and decreasing negative ones. The app, created by Colorful Zone, a new company at Velocity, the University of Waterloo's start-up incubator, has shown promising results that indicate significant improvements in users' mood when they use it. The research was conducted by Seneca Polytechnic and presented at the U.S.-based Society for Neuroscience's conference in Washington, D.C., earlier this month. "Most applications in mental wellness increase positive emotions, making you feel inspired, motivated, or excited. Joyi increases positive emotions, but it also decreases negative ones," said Negar Yaghoobi, CEO and co-founder of Colorful Zone. "We see it as a digital vitamin for your mental health."  Joyi is a game-like app with bite-sized psychology lessons aimed at developing skills for users to improve resilience to day-to-day stressors. Just as a mental health professional would tailor a treatment plan to each patient, the app's artificial intelligence component personalizes the content for each user, enhancing its effectiveness.  "We can understand users' vulnerabilities, susceptibilities, and needs so that each individual can realize sustainable happiness - whatever that means for them," said Rastin Rassoli, co-founder and head of product. "Each person needs a unique set of skills, and through interactions with the app, we gather information to personalize the psychoeducational content."  Yaghoobi explains that Joyi is designed for users who experience high stress and who may not meet psychiatric thresholds for diagnoses that would prompt comprehensive healthcare treatment.