Credentials, citations, and originality are what Google checks for first.

Several easy-to-spot signals can flag unreliable content before you read it.

We correctly identify AI-generated text only 57% of the time.

The Problem No One Taught Us to Solve

Mental health content is everywhere. It arrives on your feed before you've asked for it, sounds credible enough to act on, and rarely tells you how to verify it.

We were taught to be sceptical of obvious misinformation. Nobody prepared us for content that is fluent, warm, structured, and subtly wrong.

To understand what reliable mental health content actually looks like from the inside, I spoke with Emma Loker, a licensed therapist specialized in child and adolescent therapy, and CEO of PsychWrite, who works at the intersection of clinical accuracy and digital communication.

What Google Is Checking

I asked Emma what Google looks for when deciding whether a piece of mental health content is trustworthy. Her answer was more concrete than most readers would expect.

"First and foremost, Google checks whether the information is accurate and evidence-based," she told me. "Any factual errors, or a lack of research, affect trustworthiness. Google also checks that the author is a mental health expert, their expertise, experience, and qualifications. If these details aren't present, the piece loses credibility points."

It isn't only about the content itself. The website's overall reputation factors in too. And original content that adds clinical value, rather than restating what already exists, earns further trust. "Using clinical experience and judgement can help your content stand apart," Emma........

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