Using experience with treatment young hikikomori from Nagoya University in Japan, the authors study the context and effects of online consultation (by telephone or email). This modality of therapy only works if it is a continuation of an already-established transference relation. Certain conditions are necessary to get it started, among them a minimum respect for the setting. Online consultations can be beneficial when they favor a mediating object and re-introduce a social dimension into the private world of the hikikomori.

Adolescence, 2015, 33, 3, 559-572.