Research & Publications
Applied Human Centred Digital Solutions
Professor Campbell’s research program examines how digital technologies shape behaviour, mental health, identity, and social connection across the lifespan. His work spans cyberpsychology, digital mental health, artificial intelligence, immersive technologies, and cybersecurity, with particular expertise in youth mental health, VR/XR digital therapies, gaming, social media, cybercrime victimisation and online harms. Across these domains, he has made substantial scholarly contributions to the design, evaluation, and governance of evidence-based digital and AI-enabled mental health interventions, underpinned by a strong emphasis on clinical safety, ethical design, and real-world impact.
Between 2010 and 2016, he served as an innovation and design research partner with the Cooperative Research Centre for Young and Well, where he led nationally significant research and translation initiatives focused on the safe and effective use of technology to promote youth mental health and wellbeing. This work included the development of national policy guidance in 2013 and helped shape Australia’s early leadership in digital youth mental health.
In 2017, Professor Campbell formally established the Cyberpsychology Research Group (CRG) and has since become a core research partner for major organisations such as Kids Helpline, HP, SIMmersion, Save the Children International, CSIRO, NSW Health, SANE Australia, the Federal Circuit and Family Law Court of Australia, IDCare and the Wellbeing Health & Youth (WH&Y) Centre of Research Excellence in Adolescent Health, funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC).
A major strand of Professor Campbell’s recent research focuses on immersive technologies in healthcare. He has collaborated in ACI funded studies investigating the use of virtual reality in emergency departments at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, demonstrating that brief VR interventions can significantly reduce distress for young people awaiting medical assessment. His immersive technology research also extends to trauma-focused applications, including the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder in Australian veterans.
Another defining contribution of his research career is leadership of a longitudinal research program that spanned more than 12 years that created and validated the world’s first secure social media platform designed specifically for group counselling of young people aged 13–25 called ‘MyCircle’. Developed in partnership with yourtown’s Kids Helpline, this platform represents a globally significant innovation in digital mental health service delivery and has informed international best practice for safe, group counselling, of lived experience mental health clients via social networking. It is the only clinically moderated 24/7, peer-to-peer support social media platform certified by the Australian Government National Office of Child Safety.
Over the course of his career, Professor Campbell has attracted more than AUD $40 million in competitive research funding from government, industry, and philanthropic sources with $3.1 million as Lead Investigator. Notable funding achievements include award of $1 million BUPA Health Foundation grant awarded in 2020 to support the development of the MyCircle group counselling platform for Australian youth, as well as leadership roles in major national initiatives such as the $11.2 million Australian Government funded Small Business Cyber Resilience Service, delivered by IDCare under the National Cyber Security Strategy.
