Combining large datasets to improve mental health research Scientists join forces to understand how environment affects mental health 

More than half of the risk for mental disorders can be attributed to environmental factors such as socioeconomic status, urbanicity, pollution, and climate. Scientists are trying to characterize the impact of these factors on mental health and develop new ways to reduce the burden. This requires collecting and combining large datasets of different types. Researchers from the Earth, Brain, Health Commission published an article in Nature Mental Health, explaining how to combine data from around the world to draw reliable conclusions.

Urbanization and climate change are significant developments that modify the environment and impact human health. They are linked to disorders like depression and anxiety. Experts from many fields are collaborating on the environMENTAL project that aims to reveal how different aspects of a person's environment affect their mental health. Andre Marquand, professor of computational psychiatry from Radboud university medical center has a central role in the project.

'To get a global perspective, we need to integrate data from different sources with different types of measurements', explains Marquand. However, data integration is challenging due to different data collection methods and population differences. Marquand's team is figuring out how to combine complex data across many studies from different parts of the world. They suggest a 4-step approach: First, experts carefully review the data for quality control. Then, they make sure everything is consistent. Next, special statistical methods are applied to combine the data. Finally, the combined data is checked again to confirm that it’s reliable and usable. In the end, scientists hope to get a detailed perspective of individuals within their environment and be able to make predictions about their mental health and well-being.

Marquand's article in Nature Mental Health is part of a series related to The Earth, Brain, Health Commission (EBHC), a partnership between environMENTAL and publisher Springer Nature. This partnership aims to collect relevant knowledge in one place and provide an authoritative reference for policy decisions. EBHC brings together academic researchers, commercial partners like Google, and policy-making institutions such as the World Health Organization.

‘It's an exciting chance to use scientific research to drive policy change and improve the health of future generations', says Marquand. EBHC plans to publish a collection of scientific work that will inform a policy paper in the upcoming years. According to Marquand, 'Investing in modifying environmental, especially sociodemographic, factors will repay governments many times over by reducing the burden of mental health problems and helping people adapt better to rapidly changing environments'.  

About the publication  

The article was published in Nature Mental Health: A protocol for data harmonization in large cohorts - Maja Neidhart, Rikka Kjelkenes, Karina Jansone, Barbora Rehák Bučková, Nathalie Holz, Frauke Nees, Henrik Walter, Gunter Schumann, Michael A. Rapp, Tobias Banaschewski, Emanuel Schwarz & Andre Marquand on behalf of the environMENTAL consortium. DOI: 10.1038/s44220-024-00315-0.