Navigating the Mental Health Internet

Lesson 3.2 Directories

Directories organize web sites into categories. Directories are searched by drilling down through menus and submenus until the specific topic is found. Yahoo! is the granddaddy of Internet directories, which are also called webliographies when they contain hot links to the sites listed. Yahoo! has over 1,000,000 sites in its directory with areas for Mental Health, Nursing, and other clinical topics (e.g., Sexuality, Geriatric and Aging).

In addition to General Web Directories such as Yahoo! and Excite, there are also specialized Mental Health Internet Directories. Mental Help Net is the most comprehensive directory for mental health information and a good place to begin any search. There are also dozens of Medical Directories which have areas on psychiatry and mental health.

Many directories, because they are so large, also provide a site search engine that uses keywords to locate sites listed in the directory. Thus you can use a search engine to find listings on Yahoo! or Mental Help Net, even though they are directories.

The specialized Mental Health Internet Directories are often more efficient for locating mainstream resources such as research publications and government reports. But search engines find sites not included in the directories, such as local chapters of mental health organizations, self-help groups, foundations, and personal home pages, which can also contain useful mental health information. A complete search, especially for client resources, requires use of both a search engine and a directory.
Below are some of the most useful directories for mental health resources.

General Web Directories

Mental Health Directory

Medical Directories