Safeguarding the mental health of Arab youth

Safeguarding the mental health of Arab youth

Doha, Qatar: Several weeks into its Season 14, Qatar Foundation’s Stars of Science continued to highlight mental health challenges among youth in the Arab world, with two of its innovators addressing separate issues in this field with their inventions.

Noraldin Al-Deri, a PhD candidate in the biology of neurodevelopmental disorders, is working to tackle a problem he’s seen first-hand – potential misdiagnoses of neurodevelopmental disorders in children. Al-Deri personally witnessed the consequences a misdiagnosis can have on affected children and their families.

“Our family friend struggled with a misdiagnosis growing up, and I saw how they struggled financially and emotionally as a result – a misdiagnosis can mean we are losing a child’s potential forever,” said Al-Deri.

Al-Deri’s invention, the Infant Intellectual Auto Classifier, aims to resolve the issue by assessing a non-verbal child’s intellectual capabilities between their first four months to three years – a critical period in their development path. An algorithm collects behavioural and physiological data from children, including heart rate, eye movement and facial reactions, as they watch an animated video playing on a screen and respond to the purposeful stimuli. Based on this information, the algorithm classifies the possible zone of child’s intellectual ability and assists in the