# Structured Dialogue System for Mental Health: An LLM Chatbot Leveraging the PM+ Guidelines

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.10681 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.10681/

## Key facts

- Cited by 6 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 16 of its 18 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 16 Nov 2024.

## Builds on (most cited first, 16 of 16)

- [Training language models to follow instructions with human feedback](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.02155/) (2022)
- [LLaMA: Open and Efficient Foundation Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.13971/) (2023)
- [Llama 2: Open Foundation and Fine-Tuned Chat Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.09288/) (2023)
- [A Survey of Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.18223/) (2023)
- [G-Eval: NLG Evaluation using GPT-4 with Better Human Alignment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.16634/) (2023)
- [ChatGLM: A Family of Large Language Models from GLM-130B to GLM-4 All Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.12793/) (2024)
- [RRHF: Rank Responses to Align Language Models with Human Feedback without tears](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.05302/) (2023)
- [SoulChat: Improving LLMs' Empathy, Listening, and Comfort Abilities through Fine-tuning with Multi-turn Empathy Conversations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.00273/) (2023)
- [LLM-Eval: Unified Multi-Dimensional Automatic Evaluation for Open-Domain Conversations with Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.13711/) (2023)
- [CPsyCoun: A Report-based Multi-turn Dialogue Reconstruction and Evaluation Framework for Chinese Psychological Counseling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.16433/) (2024)
- [Building Emotional Support Chatbots in the Era of LLMs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.11584/) (2023)
- [SMILE: Single-turn to Multi-turn Inclusive Language Expansion via ChatGPT for Mental Health Support](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.00450/) (2023)
- [ChatCounselor: A Large Language Models for Mental Health Support](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.15461/) (2023)
- [Towards LLM-driven Dialogue State Tracking](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.14970/) (2023)
- [Enhancing Dialogue State Tracking Models through LLM-backed User-Agents Simulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.13037/) (2024)
- [PsyChat: A Client-Centric Dialogue System for Mental Health Support](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.04262/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 6 of 6)

- [HamRaz: A Culture-Based Persian Conversation Dataset for Person-Centered Therapy Using LLM Agents](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.05982/) (2025)
- [Method-Based Reasoning for Large Language Models: Extraction, Reuse, and Continuous Improvement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.04289/) (2025)
- [Position: Beyond Assistance -- Reimagining LLMs as Ethical and Adaptive Co-Creators in Mental Health Care](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.16456/) (2025)
- [EmoStage: A Framework for Accurate Empathetic Response Generation via Perspective-Taking and Phase Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.19279/) (2025)
- [Are Today's LLMs Ready to Explain Well-Being Concepts?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.03990/) (2025)
- [StageWell: A Process-Aligned Chinese Corpus for Positive-Psychology Support Dialogue](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.29326/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The Structured Dialogue System, referred to as SuDoSys, is an innovative Large Language Model (LLM)-based chatbot designed to provide psychological counseling. SuDoSys leverages the World Health Organization (WHO)'s Problem Management Plus (PM+) guidelines to deliver stage-aware multi-turn dialogues. Existing methods for employing an LLM in multi-turn psychological counseling typically involve direct fine-tuning using generated dialogues, often neglecting the dynamic stage shifts of counseling sessions. Unlike previous approaches, SuDoSys considers the different stages of counseling and stores essential information throughout the counseling process, ensuring coherent and directed conversations. The system employs an LLM, a stage-aware instruction generator, a response unpacker, a topic database, and a stage controller to maintain dialogue flow. In addition, we propose a novel technique that simulates counseling clients to interact with the evaluated system and evaluate its performance automatically. When assessed using both objective and subjective evaluations, SuDoSys demonstrates its effectiveness in generating logically coherent responses. The system's code and program scripts for evaluation are open-sourced.