I recently ran across two different, new apps in development for smartphones and iPhones, both of which purport to measure a person’s mental health, happiness and even depression completely passively. (“Apps” are tiny pieces of software that run most commonly on portable devices.)

This, of course, is a Big Deal, since one of the major stumbling blocks of the thousands upon thousands of health apps are their need for something or someone to input personal health data. Without personal health data, health and mental health apps are generally pretty useless.

The method to measure one’s psychological well-being (or, as we more commonly refer to it, one’s happiness) passively is to use whatever metrics are available through the phone. Since phones generally only have a limited amount of inputs — voice, video, geo-positioning (GPS), and an accelerometer — your choices as a researcher interested in personal health data are pretty limiting.

Using only these four physical measurements, is it really possible to accurately and reliably measure a person’s well-being? Let’s find out.

Recently I had the chance to ask Margarita Tartakovsky, an associate editor at Psych Central, a few questions about eating behavior.  She blogs regularly about eating and self-image issues on her blog Weightless.

Q. Why doesn’t the current model of treating obesity — only telling people what and how much to eat — work for most people?

A. Great question, because the current model definitely doesn’t work. I can’t remember who said it, but there’s a saying that if you want to gain weight, go on a diet. Diets have a failure rate of about 95 percent. People may lose weight initially but then they usually gain it back and then some.

So this model doesn’t work for many reasons. For one thing, genetics plays a prominent role in our weight. This is why you can have two people who eat the same foods in the same quantities look very different. One may be thin; the other may be considered “overweight.” Our bodies are more complicated than the “calories in, calories out” equation assumes.

Integrative medicine can be defined as “a healing-oriented discipline that takes into account the whole person — body, mind and spirit — including all aspects of lifestyle. It emphasizes the therapeutic relationship and makes use of both conventional and alternative therapies.”

Complementary and alternative therapies used in integrative medicine can include acupuncture, chiropractic, herbal medicine, dietary supplements and others that give the clinician a wide array of treatments for difficult conditions. This is particularly true in the integrative medicine approach to eating disorders.

Eating disorders have been documented in adolescents and adults for many years. More recently, there is evidence that these disorders can also affect young children.

The cornerstones of an integrative medicine model for eating disorders includes some components that are found in every approach to the treatment of eating disorders, but may be used in a unique manner. Others are more specific to the use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) therapies. The most important difference in this model when compared to other treatment strategies is the philosophical underpinning of integrative medicine — that is, the belief in the self-healing nature of body, mind and spirit.

As folks get ready to watch the Super Bowl on television this Sunday in the U.S., many of us will be joining or attending Super Bowl viewing parties. If you’re like most Americans, you’ll probably drive to get to that party.

But unlike most Sundays, when you drive this Sunday coming home from your Super Bowl Party, be especially careful. Why?

Because unlike other Sundays when a football game is televised, researchers found that both non-fatal and fatal car accidents increase 41 percent on average. The risk is highest within an hour of the game’s end, when most people are driving home.

What causes this rise in automobile accidents? Not surprising, alcohol was involved in most fatal injury accidents, as well as a majority of non-fatal accidents. Inattention and fatigue are two additional factors implicated.

I am often told that I should grow a thicker skin. I’m too sensitive. I let things get to me too much. Most people who struggle with depression are the same. We are more transparent and therefore absorb more into the gray matter of our brain than our thicker-skinned counterpoints.

In his book, Your Emotional Type, Michael A. Jawer and Marc S. Micozzi, Ph.D. examine the interplay of emotions, chronic illness and pain, and treatment success. They discuss how chronic conditions are intrinsically linked to certain emotional types.

I found the boundary concept they explain in the book — first developed by Ernest Hartmann, MD, of Tufts University — especially intriguing.

“Because people with ADD live fairly fast-paced lives, they can forget to slow down a little and consider whether they are living a balanced life,” writes ADHD expert and psychotherapist Stephanie Sarkis, Ph.D, in her book 10 Simple Solutions to Adult ADD: How to Overcome Chronic Distraction & Accomplish Your Goals.

Self-care is key to balance. In her book Sarkis shares the various ways people with ADHD can practice self-care. This includes attending to your physical wellness, emotional wellness and spiritual wellness.

(By the way, these tips also are great for everyone.)

Here are valuable suggestions from Sarkis’s book on practicing each type of wellness.

About 30 to 40 percent of people will experience significant distress after learning that they have cancer, according to James C. Coyne, Ph.D, director of the Behavioral Oncology Program at the Abramson Cancer Center and professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. But it tends to resolve after three or four months, he said.

Clinical depression, however, affects about 16 percent of cancer patients, according to a 2011 study published in The Lancet Oncology. Researchers analyzed 94 studies with more than 14,000 patients. Depression was especially common — with 30 to 40 percent of patients affected — when other mood disorders were present.

Depression also appears to affect people with certain cancers to a greater degree, such as oropharyngeal (22–57 percent), pancreatic (33–50 percent), breast (2–46 percent) and lung cancers (11–44 percent), according to Derek Hopko, Ph.D, associate professor at The University of Tennessee and co-author of A Cancer Patient’s Guide to Overcoming Depression and Anxiety: Getting Through Treatment and Getting Back to Your Life.

I love it when you get hit over the head with your own words.

Today I read a meaningful email by someone who had read my book. She said it was the passage on page 120 to 121 that provided the epiphany moment she needed to seek help for her mood disorder.

I was curious to see what was on these pages, so I got a copy out and read this…

Most of us have had direct experience with seeing a doctor or therapist, whether it’s for a checkup or some sort of problem we’ve identified. Some docs are a pleasure to see. I once had the kindest physician who was the epitome of an old-fashioned French country doctor. I’m not sure if he was my best doctor ever (he tended to treat my concerns with a “wait and see” attitude), but he certainly had a fantastic bedside manner and never kept me waiting more than a few minutes.

I appreciated that even more when I went to see my most recent doctor. He was far more gruff, business-like, and running more than 20 minutes late for our appointment. He didn’t apologize for keeping me waiting, and while he listened to my family history with detached professionalism, he went through his canned speech about needing to exercise regularly and other kinds of things with the kind of empty delivery you find in a person who’s said the same thing so many times it has lost all meaning.

Doctors and therapists both can keep bad habits, and they are the kinds of things that turn patients off from them. Patients rarely feel it’s appropriate to address these bad habits directly with the doctor (especially if they intend to keep seeing them), so it was with some relief I came across Dr. Dominic Carone’s blog entry about the “10 ways doctors can lose their patients.”

With the rise of video game controllers that don’t require you to be wired to the console and be adept at thumb button-pressing — such as the Wii and the xBox Kinect — a new genre of video games have also been developed: active video games (AVGs).

Active video games — also known as “exergames” — are games that combine game mechanics with activity or exercise. Dance Dance Revolution (DDR), for instance, is a simple dance competition game that has sold over 11 million copies worldwide since its latest release just two years ago.

Many people buy exercise games, such as Wii Fit and Wii Fit Plus, to help them enjoy exercising more. Which then begs the question — do such exergames actually act as good substitutes for a more traditional physical workout?

It has been suggested that we are often unaware of external factors that influence eating behavior (Wansink, 2006; Vartaninan et al., 2008).  There is a substantial body of research that shows external factors have a robust influence on eating behavior (Epstein et al., 2009; Remick et al., 2009; Rozin et al., 2003). 

These external factors include things such as portion size, labeling, variety of food we eat, and how much attention we pay when we’re eating (or whether we’re distracted by socializing, for instance). Even the plate size can affect how we eat.

Now, some researchers have suggested that external factors may play a larger role in eating behavior than internal factors, such as hunger, satiety, flavor, macro-nutrient content, and so on (Wansink et al., 2007; Levitsky, 2005; Wansink, et al., 2005). 

What’s behind these external or environmental factors and their role in how we eat?

I’ve discovered that the key to my happiness project is my determination to make and keep my innumerable resolutions. I follow — or try to follow — dozens of resolutions, and they’ve made a real difference in the happiness of my everyday life.

One resolution that many people make and break is the resolution to exercise. Exercise is a key to good health, and for me, has always been essential to feeling cheerful. In fact, when I’m feeling blue, one of the best ways to shake the mood is to exercise. Also, exercising has a strange double effect: it makes me feel both calmer and more energetic.

My husband is the same way. On Sunday, he was feeling low, and a trip to the gym chirked him up considerably.

And even if I don’t feel better, at least I have the satisfaction of knowing that I exercised.