Understanding Remote Mental Health Supporters' Help-Seeking in Online Communities

TL;DR

This study qualitatively examines how remote mental health caregivers seek help and support in online communities, highlighting their unique challenges and community responses to improve digital support systems.

Contribution

It provides new insights into remote caregivers' online help-seeking behaviors and community interactions, emphasizing nuanced experiences and design recommendations for better support.

Findings

Remote caregivers seek guidance, emotional support, and validation.

Community responses include emotional support and sharing personal experiences.

Remote caregivers face unique challenges like digital silence during crises.

Abstract

Providing mental health support for loved ones across a geographic distance creates unique challenges for the remote caregivers, who sometimes turn to online communities for peer support. We qualitatively analyzed 522 Reddit threads to understand what drives remote caregivers' online help-seeking behaviors and the responses they receive from the community. Their purposes of posting included requesting guidance, expressing emotions, and seeking validation. Community responses included providing emotional support, suggesting informational strategies, and sharing personal experiences. While certain themes in posts (emotional toll, monitoring symptoms, and prioritizing caregiver well-being) are shared across remote and non-remote contexts, remote caregivers' posts surfaced nuanced experiences. For example, they often rely on digital cues, such as voice, to interpret care receivers' well-being while struggling with digital silence during crises. We discuss the need for supporting communication and information sharing between remote caregivers and receivers, care coordination for crisis management, and design recommendations for caregiver communities.