International Journal of Science, Engineering and TechnologyAuthors: Nandini Chourasiya, Piyush Ghoshi, Yash Jhanwar, Sayed Ozair Mehmood, Prof. Shahida Khan, Prof. Pawan K. Gupta
Abstract: The escalating mental health crisis among university students, characterized by rising rates of anxiety, depression, academic burnout, and social isolation, demands innovative and accessible support systems. This paper presents MINDFUL, a comprehensive AI-powered mental health and wellness platform purpose-built for students. MINDFUL integrates an intelligent 24/7 chatbot for emotional first aid, a confidential appointment booking system with professional counselors, psychoeducational resources, mood journaling with pattern analytics, crisis support modules, gamified wellness tracking, and a safe peer community forum into one unified ecosystem. The platform employs Natural Language Processing (NLP) for empathetic conversational support, machine learning for emotional pattern detection and burnout prediction, and a React.js and Node.js-based microservice architecture backed by MongoDB for scalable data management. MINDFUL is designed to reduce stigma, improve accessibility, and enable early intervention before mental health issues become severe. Evaluation of the proposed system demonstrates measurable improvements in student engagement with mental health services, reduced response latency for crisis detection, and a significant reduction in counselor appointment scheduling overhead. This paper outlines the system architecture, core modules, technology stack, use case scenarios, and the projected societal impact of MINDFUL on student mental well-being.
DOI: http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20702135
