Willingness to use internet-based versus bibliotherapy interventions in a representative US sample: cross-sectional survey study
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Background: Self-help interventions have the potential to increase access to evidence-based mental health care. Self-help can be delivered via different formats, including print media or digital mental health interventions (DMHIs). However, we do not know which delivery format is more likely to result in higher engagement. Objective: The aims of this study were to identify if there is a preference for engaging in print media versus DMHIs and whether there are individual differences in relative preferences. Methods: Participants were 423 adults between the ages of 18 and 82 years (201/423, 47.5% female) recruited on Prolific as a nationally representative sample of the US population, including non-Hispanic White (293/423, 69.2%), non-Hispanic Black (52/423, 12%), Asian (31/423, 7%), Hispanic (25/423, 6%), and other individuals (22/423, 5%). We provided individuals with psychoeducation in different self-help formats and measured their willingness to use print media versus DMHIs. We also assessed participants’ demographics, personality, and perception of each format’s availability and helpfulness and used these to predict individual differences in the relative preferences. Results: Participants reported being more willing to engage with print media than with DMHIs (B=0.41, SE 0.08; t422=4.91; P<.001; d=0.24, 95% CI 0.05-0.43). This preference appeared to be influenced by education level (B=0.22, SE 0.09; t413=2.41; P=.02; d=0.13, 95% CI –0.06 to 0.32), perceived helpfulness (B=0.78, SE 0.06; t411=13.66; P<.001; d=0.46, 95% CI 0.27-0.66), and perceived availability (B=0.20, SE 0.58; t411=3.25; P=.001; d=0.12, 95% CI 0.07-0.30) of the self-help format. Conclusions: This study suggests an overall preference for print media over DMHIs. Future work should investigate whether receiving mental health treatment via participants’ preferred delivery format can lead to higher engagement.
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Digital bibliotherapy can be effective and well-accepted in addressing emotional problems such as depression and anxiety.
“Existing studies suggest that this format can be effective and well-accepted in addressing emotional problems such as depression and anxiety (79, 80).”
From Recent developments in bibliotherapy for adolescent depression (2025) · cites this paper as [79]
The Introduction’s “Self-help Interventions” section reports evidence that print bibliotherapy and digital mental health interventions can reduce depression. It treats them as separate formats, however, and does not establish the effectiveness of digital bibliotherapy for anxiety. The Results (“Overall Preference”; page unavailable) found greater willingness to use print media than digital interventions, so the claim that the digital format is well-accepted is not established by this study. (LLM, conf=0.86)
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- Authors
- De Jesús-Romero, R., Wasil, A., & Lorenzo-Luaces, L.
- Affiliations
- Indiana University Bloomington (US)
- Venue
- JMIR Formative Research
- Publisher
- JMIR Publications Inc.
- Published
- 2022-08-24
- Volume
- 6
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- e39508
- ISSN
- 2561-326X (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC9453577
- OpenAlex
- W4286304738
- Cited by
- 18
- References
- 34
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 2
- FWCI
- 3.31
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- JMIR Formative Research (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- American Psychological Association
- National Institutes of Health (KL2TR002530, UL1TR002529)
- National Institute of Mental Health (MH103213, T32MH103213)
- National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Digital Mental Health Interventions
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Mental Health Treatment and Access
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Mobile Health and mHealth Applications
- Keywords
- digital mental health interventions, bibliotherapy, print media, treatment engagement, psychoeducation, perceived helpfulness, perceived availability, educational attainment, personality, individual differences, access to mental health care, digital divide, older adults, racial and ethnic differences, gender differences, self-efficacy, help-seeking intentions, help-seeking facilitators
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