Self-help books for people with depression: A scoping review

Background: There has been little research into self-help books for people with depression, despite the apparent plethora of such titles. As an initial step, we undertook a scoping review of available books.Aim: To identify the number of self-help books for people with depression or mixed anxiety and depression that are available in the UK and to describe their principle characteristics.Methods: We located publicly available self-help books for people with depression or mixed anxiety and depression. We extracted data from the books we located that included descriptive information (including the psychological approach used), readability statistics and popularity measures.Results: We analysed data from 97 books. These publications were diverse in both structure and content. Structure and readability data illustrated that many potential readers may have difficulty using some of them. Popularity proved to be an unreliable way of locating books that would fulfil NICE guidance for a CBT based self-help programme.Conclusions: Many of the available books are complex to read in terms of literacy levels and may present additional problems given the concentration problems of people with depression. There is no relationship between popularity and a book being evidence-based or readable.