Navigating self-injury in a digital world: adolescents' perspectives on coping, help-seeking, and technology

Key Findings

• — 21 adolescents aged 14 to 18 with lived experience of self-injury were interviewed between May 2024 and April 2025, recruited via a national mental-health nonprofit's online screener.
• — Stigma and fear of disclosure pushed participants toward digital channels rather than formal care.
• — Participants described using ChatGPT specifically to regulate emotions, reflect, seek advice and discuss sensitive topics they would not raise with adults.
• — They valued accessibility, privacy and immediacy, and criticised inaccurate or generic AI responses and limited moderation in online peer communities.
• — Most expressed ambivalence about stopping self-injury despite knowing the harms, which complicates any design that assumes a motivated help-seeker.

Methodology Notes

Qualitative thematic analysis of 21 interviews; self-selected via an online screener on a nonprofit's website, so participants are already help-seeking to some degree; US only; no measurement of behaviour or outcomes. Published 2026-08-26 in Frontiers in Digital Health, CC BY 4.0, DOI 10.3389/fdgth.2026.1905943; abstract and metadata verified at Crossref.

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