In October 2016, more than ten thousand people from 104 countries logged how they were feeling over seven days, creating the largest open-source database of emotions.
The data is free to download by any individual, organisation, or government to create more effective mental health initiatives. With over 800,000 people suiciding around the world each year, more effective mental health initiatives are desperately needed.
More people suicide globally each year than those who die of breast cancer, violence, or war. Poor mental health is a major social and economic challenge. Isolation is a major contributing factor to poor mental health, and the app provides the ability to see, in real-time, how other people are feeling.
This helps normalise the extremely broad range of emotions that are experienced be people around the world. Users contribute their own data and emotions in a safe space where they test "sharing how they feel".
How is the World Feeling? is an invaluable tool for self-reflection and support - encouraging users to frequently reflect and log their emotions. The app retains a comprehensive history of emotions logged that can be access by the user at any time.
The app also responds in real-time to user's mental health needs with prompts and recommendations when "negative" emotions are consistently being logged. Support services in over 60+ countries are included.
Users of the app have logged over 52,000 emotions - creating the largest open-source database of real-time mental health data anywhere in the world. This data is cross-referenced against demographic information, creating an extremely dense source of knowledge.
It is critical to note that no personally-identifiable information is ever shared: This includes removal of all usernames, and truncation of all geographic coordinates.
