Papers by Elham Aghakhani
Decoding the Narratives: Analyzing Personal Drug Experiences Shared on Reddit (2024.findings-acl)
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| Challenge: | Our study aims to develop a multi-level, multi-label classification model to analyze online user-generated texts about substance use experiences. |
| Approach: | They propose a taxonomy to assess the nature of posts, including intended connections (Inquisition or Disclosure), subjects (e.g., Recovery, Dependency), and specific objectives (eg. relapse, quality, safety). |
| Outcome: | The proposed model outperforms other models on annotated data and shows that topics such as Safety, Combination of Substances, and Mental Health see more disclosure, while discussions about physiological Effects focus on harm reduction. |
Words Matter: Reducing Stigma in Online Conversations about Substance Use with Large Language Models (2024.emnlp-main)
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| Challenge: | Only 7% of people living with an SUD receive any form of treatment, with stigma reported as a major barrier. |
| Approach: | They propose a computational framework for analyzing stigma and de-stigmatizing online content and delving into the linguistic features that propagate stigma towards PWUS. |
| Outcome: | The proposed model transforms stigmatizing language into more empathetic language and analyzes over 1.2 million posts on social media . |
From Conversation to Automation: Leveraging LLMs for Problem-Solving Therapy Analysis (2025.findings-acl)
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| Challenge: | Problem-Solving Therapy (PST) is a structured psychological approach that helps individuals manage stress and resolve personal issues. |
| Approach: | They developed a framework for PST annotation using established PST Core Strategies and a set of novel Facilitative Strategies to analyze a corpus of real-world therapy transcripts to determine which strategies are most prevalent. |
| Outcome: | The proposed framework outperforms existing models and LLMs to identify the most prevalent strategies in a corpus of real-world therapy transcripts. |
Like a Therapist, But Not: Reddit Narratives of AI in Mental Health Contexts (2026.findings-acl)
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| Challenge: | Large language models are increasingly used for emotional support and mental health–related interactions outside clinical settings. |
| Approach: | They analyze 5,126 Reddit posts describing use of AI for emotional support or therapy . positive sentiment is most strongly associated with task and goal alignment, they say . |
| Outcome: | The proposed framework analyzes language, adoption-related attitudes, and relational alignment at scale. positive sentiment is most strongly associated with task and goal alignment. |