Clinicians' practices and attitudes toward depression assessment: a cross-sectional survey study
Navandi, D., Eijsbroek, V. C., Wiebel, C., Marker, A., Kjell, K., Molendijk, M. L., Stade, E. C., & Kjell, O. N. E. (2026). Clinicians' practices and attitudes toward depression assessment: a cross-sectional survey study. BMC Psychology, 14, 1227. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-026-05036-w
@article{navandi2026clinicians,
title = {{Clinicians' practices and attitudes toward depression assessment: a cross-sectional survey study}},
author = {Damon Navandi and Veerle C. Eijsbroek and Clara Wiebel and Aaron Marker and Katarina Kjell and Marc L. Molendijk and Elizabeth C. Stade and Oscar N.E. Kjell},
year = {2026},
journal = {BMC Psychology},
doi = {10.1186/s40359-026-05036-w},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-026-05036-w}
}
Abstract
This survey examined how 585 mental health professionals from the U.S., the U.K., the Netherlands, Sweden and other countries assess depression, and their attitudes toward standardized approaches. Clinicians used many different methods, most often unstructured clinical interviews (83%) and rating scales (83%), and most (80%) combined the information using clinical judgment rather than statistical approaches (11%). Although 77% considered validated, standardized assessments important, most had not fully adopted them, and about 43% were interested in AI-supported decision tools. The results show a gap between research-supported best practices and how depression is assessed in clinical practice.
