- BLAIN NELSON'S ABUSE PAGES
- Depth of Content: 7, Ease of Use: 6, Presentation of Information: 4, Overall Experience: 6
Blain Nelson's Abuse Pages offers a load of information and resources on domestic violence and other types of abuse, although it's emphasis seems to be on the former. I liked it because it was written from the side of a former abuser, and so has a lot to say to those who may also be abusing their significant others and suggestions about how and where to get help. Could better present the information it has to offer, and check out a few broken links, but otherwise a top-notch resource.
- AMERICAN PSYCHIATRIC ASSOCIATION
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 6, Presentation of Information: 8, Overall Experience: 7
Filled with a wide variety of information on mental disorders, the professional association itself, consumer-oriented "Let's Talk Facts" brochures, and a whole lot more for psychiatrists and laypeople. The site is relatively well-designed with sharp graphics. It is, however, much too hierarchial in its information presentation, requiring the reader to access sub-menu after sub-menu to get to the real good and useful content.
- AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 6, Presentation of Information: 5, Overall Experience: 6
A Web site full of useful information about journals as well as consumer information, press releases, and professional information related to the psychological profession. It also serves as an online publishing mirror for the psychologist's monthly newspaper, the APA Monitor, offering listings from their continuing education calendar, classified ads, and select full-text articles every month. Design suffers from a lack of overall organization and style standards from page to page within the site, which also impairs navigation. I also discovered many invalid links, some of which were to their own search engine!
- THE ANXIETY PANIC INTERNET RESOURCE (tAPir)
- Depth of Content: 10, Ease of Use: 9, Presentation of Information: 8, Overall Experience: 9
tAPir (formerly known as Noodles' Panic-Anxiety Page) is the definition of what a self-help resource on the Web should strive to be! Everything is here, right down to the choice of what kind of page to load (graphics-intensive versus plainer text). It not only offers comprehensive lists of links to information on panic attacks and anxiety information online, but also has more personal touches, like peoples' individual stories in grappling with these disorders. Instructions for subscribing to a mailing list, information on treatment resources, a booklist and a whole lot more is offered on this page. And maybe that's their only fault -- in trying so hard to cover everything, they may go a bit too far (e.g. - sections on depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder). The premiere resource for anxiety on the Web today.
- ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER WWW ARCHIVE
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 7
The Attention Deficit WWW Archive by Meng Weng Wong is an excellent place to being your travels online if you suffer from this disorder or know someone who does. Unlike many Web pages today offering nothing but a circle of links to links to links, this page offers a great deal of ADD/ADHD content, which was much appreciated. And since its independently-run, the information presented tends to be more objective than that found at other sites. Nothing fancy, just good stuff, with a few links to other ADD/ADHD resources online.
- CHILDREN AND ADULTS WITH ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 7
Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Disorder, otherwise known as CHADD, is a sometimes-controversial group that was created to help support individuals with attention deficit disorder finding support and help for treatment in their community. While I sometimes disagree with some of their views, their Web page here is well organized, easy to use and offers a great deal of useful information to those suffering or know someone who suffers from ADD or ADHD. You'll find diagnostic and treatment information here, as well as addresses and phone numbers of community resources.
- AUTISM RESOURCES
- Depth of Content: 4, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 5, Overall Experience: 5
Autism Resources doesn't pretend to be anything more than a listing of autism resources online. And it offers them straight-forward fashion, without any bells or whistles, in an easy-to-use manner. Newsgroups, Web resources and mailing lists are all here and worth looking into.
- BEHAVIOR ONLINE
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 9, Overall Experience: 8
Behavior OnLine is the new kid on the block, billing itself as the "gathering place" for professionals in the behavioral science and related fields. And it makes good on its initial premise, offering not only in-depth conversations with some of the leading theorists and therapists in the mental health field today, but also a place for other professional to interact directly with those conversationalists, discussing their ideas and theories. More open than the traditional gathering places (for instance, mailing lists) for professionals online, this site has the potential to become even better in months to come. One of most well-designed and graphically-pleasing sites on the Web today.
- COGNITIVE & PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCES ON THE INTERNET
- Depth of Content: 10, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 8
To find research-oriented resources in the cognitive or psychological field, make Cognitive and Psychological Sciences on the Internet one of the first stops in your journey. One of the oldest and largest on-line resources to exist in the professional mental health field, this one has kept up-to-date with the times. It offers extensive and well-documented links to thousands of other on-line resources in academia, discussion lists, organization and conferences, journals and magazines, software and much more. The files here are still large, even when divided into these general categories, so be prepared!
- ANDREW'S DEPRESSION PAGE
- Depth of Content: 7, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 8, Overall Experience: 8
Andrew's Depression Page is a depression page I can whole-heartedly recommend to those suffering from this disorder. The site is brimming full of poems, stories, and many helpful links to depression resources. Unfortunately, on the day I re-visited it for this review, it was extremely slow in accessing the information on it, which I hope was only a temporary problem. A lot of other pages point to the stories and poems found here, but this is where they reside, in a sub-section called "Voices of Depression."
- DEPRESSION RESOURCES LIST
- Depth of Content: 7, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 7, Overall Experience: 7
The Depression Resources List is the most comprehensive and easiest to use of the half-dozen or so Web sites devoted to depression and mood disorders online. Picking the premiere depression link among these wasn't easy, as it came down to three that were almost equally as good, yet this one by Dennis Taylor took our prize because it was easier to use and friendlier than either of the other two. While certainly not the oldest or full of the most content (it is, after all, just a list), it is the most updated, has the cleanest look while offering the most links to everybody else's mood-related sites with useful comments beside each link.
- EATING DISORDERS, ANOREXIA, BULIMIA
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 9, Overall Experience: 9
Something Fishy's Eating Disorders is a blow-your-socks-off excellent site that has oodles of information about eating disorders, links to the Eating Disorder FAQ, and numerous poems and stories from others suffering from bulimia and anorexia. If you have an eating disorder, or know someone who does that you care about, this is the site to check out and read thoroughly. Updated frequently, well-designed, and a pleasure to visit time and time again. (A dedicated site.)
- FACTS FOR FAMILIES
- Depth of Content: 6, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 5, Overall Experience: 6
Facts for Families is one part of The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Homepage, and the most useful. It offers easy-to-read and understand information presented in a brochure-style to parents and families dealing with children who have some sort of mental disorder. All too often the Web is content-free, but here is a lot of content for parents looking for some answers online.
- CRISIS, GRIEF & HEALING
- Depth of Content: 7, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 7, Overall Experience: 7
Tom Golden LCSW's Crisis, Grief and Healing site is devoted to helping people understand and therefore better be able to deal with their grief, paying attention to the different ways the genders grieve. While Tom is selling some booklets here, he does provide extensive excerpts from them on-line and puts a great deal of work and effort to make these pages useful and helpful. Most touching, however, are the dozens of personal stories placed here, for everyone to read and share. (A dedicated site.)
- GENERAL HOSPITAL
- Depth of Content: N/A, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 9, Overall Experience: 8
Not your typical mental health site, General Hospital is a multimedia poetic experience examining the depths of mental illness and how society looks at those with mental disorders. It offers a unique approach, combining art and information about mental health in society today. Worth a visit for a completely different look at mental health. Graphics-intensive, so be prepared.
- GO ASK ALICE
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 8
Columbia University Health Service offers Go Ask Alice, chock full of health education and wellness tips. They will answer any health question on sex, relationships, drugs, general health and emotional well-being. Best yet, they archive all of their responses so you can check out if your question has already been asked in their extensive archives. The responses given are reasonable and sound in their advice, so you know you won't be misled. Plus, it's easier to get an answer than writing to Dear Abby!
- HANOVER COLLEGE PSYCHOLOGY DEPARTMENT
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 7
Maintained by John Krantz, the Hanover College Psychology Department is an outstanding example of useful work that more psychology departments, especially at larger and better-funded universities, should pay attention to. While I wasn't too crazy with the graphics at the site, maneuvering through the extensive and updated listings of journals online, other psychology departments, tutorials in psychology, etc. was relatively easy. This is the first place to check for online journals.
- INTERNET MENTAL HEALTH
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 5, Overall Experience: 7
Internet Mental Health has long been one of my favorite comprehensive mental health information site that has so much information, it really should have a search engine. Composed by a physician in Canada, Phillip Long, it has basic diagnostic criteria for mental health disorders, as well as some treatment guidelines (some of which I strongly disagree with) and links to many other sites. Suffers from boring graphics and an unoriginal layout, which requires wading through too many sub-menus to get to the really useful information, plus not enough cross-references for laypeople (e.g. - "major depression" = "depression"). In the past, this site has suffered from some serious DNS entry errors, but they now claim to have been resolved.
- NEUROFEEDBACK ARCHIVE
- Depth of Content: 6, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 6
The Neurofeedback Archive by the Society for the Study of Neuronal Regulation is a site that will mainly interest professionals in neurofeedback, such as EEG or biofeedback. Its main offerings are full-length articles as well as abstracts reprinted with permission from their own members, as well as some reprinted from regular professional journals. While this page apparently hasn't been updated in a few months, I hope it continues to offer professionals in this field a valuable resource. No links to other pages here.
- PENDULUM RESOURCES
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 7, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 7
One of the oldest mailing lists on bipolar disorder (otherwise known as manic-depression) also has a Web site, Pendulum Resource, which is a very comprehensive resource on bipolar disorder, offering online resources, symptom lists, book lists, medications, treatment options, etc. From humor to personal home pages of people who suffer from this disorder, this is a great site to visit over and over again.
- PERSONALITY AND CONSCIOUSNESS -- Eric Pettifor
- Depth of Content: 6, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 9, Overall Experience: 8
An excellent site devoted to discussing the major theorists in personality psychology, including Alfred Adler, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, George Kelly, Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, B.F. Skinner, and Charles T. Tart. Offers their respective theories and philosophies on doing psychotherapy. Updated regularly and an original design. Looks and works best with frames, but a non-framed version is available, naturally.
- PHARMACEUTICAL INFORMATION NETWORK HOME PAGE (PHARMINFONET)
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 6, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 7
PharmInfoNet is a comprehensive site on medications, offering a searchable database, FAQs and general information about most drugs now available. Could be easier to use (too many layers!) and the search engine could be more powerful, but if you're on a medication and want to learn more about it, this is the place to check out. Includes information like common side-effects and contra-indications. Great for professionals and laypeople alike!
- PSYCHOPHARMACOLOGY TIPS
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 5, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 6
Psychopharmacology Tips by Dr. Bob Hsiung, M.D. offers a wealth of knowledge to professionals looking for some of the spoken lore about how best to prescribe psychotropic medications. If you're a psychiatrist and you're online, you should be reading this page every week. Arranged according to types of medications, as well as problem-areas, it's relatively easy-to-use. Information found here is continuously updated and re-compiled by Dr. Bob from the psychophamacology professional mailing list. Uses frames.
- SEXUAL ASSAULT INFORMATION PAGE -- Chris Bartley
- Depth of Content: 8, Ease of Use: 6, Presentation of Information: 7, Overall Experience: 7
For sexual abuse victims, Chris Bartley's Sexual Assault Information Page is very complete in the level of information for all sorts of victims adults, children, men, women, and has many links to other useful resources online for recovery. A FAQ is here, as well as a newsletter and many other interesting tidbits of information. The first page may take a little while to load, but it's worth the wait.
- DAVID BALDWIN'S TRAUMA INFO PAGES
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 9, Presentation of Information: 8, Overall Experience: 9
David Baldwin's Trauma Info Pages are a great set of resources that focus primarily on emotional trauma and traumatic stress, including PTSD (Post-traumatic Stress Disorder), whether following individual traumatic experience(s) or a large-scale disaster. I liked them particularly well because they are kept up-to-date regularly and the amount of useful information found in them is sometimes overwhelming. But with a simple and logical organization combined with a pleasant reading background, they are a joy to discover. The information is written by a licensed psychologist, so it's trustworthy and accurate. A search engine and mirror sites complement this wonderful resource.
- WEB OF ADDICTIONS
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 6, Overall Experience: 8
The Web of Addictions is a wonderful, thoroughly thought-out page that offers numerous links and content in one site. Produced by Andrew Homer and Dick Dillon, it offers information about not only online resources such as Web pages and mailing lists, but off-line, real-world organizations where more help can be obtained for individuals suffering from a substance or alcohol abuse problem. If either you or someone you know is suffering from an addiction, this is the first place to turn to online.
- THE WHOLEFAMILY CENTER
- Depth of Content: 9, Ease of Use: 8, Presentation of Information: 8, Overall Experience: 8
I don't usually give out Grohol Best of the Web awards to newcomers, but this site is so fascinating, I couldn't resist. Real-life dramas are scripted and provided for your enjoyment and education via text or RealAudio playback. Categories include parental, marital and teen/child issues. Each section has a number of "plays" which address real-life issues. For example, under the marital category, issues such as money, exhaustion, sex, and discipline are addressed. One of the few really unique and valuable additions to the Web I've seen lately.
BEST OF THE WEB IN MENTAL HEALTH
As of June, 1999
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The following Web sites have been rated by myself -- a long-time mental health
advocate and pioneer online -- as being among the very best offerings on the Web today. For more information on the rating system, please see the rating guidelines. The Web sites are listed in alphabetical order and detailed ratings are
calculated on a 1 to 10 scale, where 10 equals the best possible.
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