The growing demand for mental health support has highlighted the importance
of conversational agents as human supporters worldwide and in China. These
agents could increase availability and reduce the relative costs of mental
health support. The provided support can be divided into two main types:
cognitive and emotional support. Existing work on this topic mainly focuses on
constructing agents that adopt Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) principles.
Such agents operate based on pre-defined templates and exercises to provide
cognitive support. However, research on emotional support using such agents is
limited. In addition, most of the constructed agents operate in English,
highlighting the importance of conducting such studies in China. In this study,
we analyze the effectiveness of Emohaa in reducing symptoms of mental distress.
Emohaa is a conversational agent that provides cognitive support through
CBT-based exercises and guided conversations. It also emotionally supports
users by enabling them to vent their desired emotional problems. The study
included 134 participants, split into three groups: Emohaa (CBT-based), Emohaa
(Full), and control. Experimental results demonstrated that compared to the
control group, participants who used Emohaa experienced considerably more
significant improvements in symptoms of mental distress. We also found that
adding the emotional support agent had a complementary effect on such
improvements, mainly depression and insomnia. Based on the obtained results and
participants' satisfaction with the platform, we concluded that Emohaa is a
practical and effective tool for reducing mental distress.

本研究旨在分析 Emohaa 在中国使用的效果。Emohaa 是一种通过 CBT 训练的会话型代理人，采用 CBT 的练习和引导式对话提供认知支持，并通过让用户发泄情感问题来提供情感支持。实验结果表明，与控制组相比，使用 Emohaa 的参与者在精神困扰症状上显著改善更多。同时，我们还发现加入情感支持代理人对改善情感困扰的效果有补充性影响，特别是对抑郁症和失眠症的改善。这些结果表明 Emohaa 是一个实用且有效的减轻精神压力的工具。