Avatar-led Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Smoking Cessation

NCT ID: NCT03631212

Last Updated: 2018-08-21

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: UNKNOWN
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 300 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2017-09-15
• Study Completion Date: 2020-07-30

Brief Summary

Smoking remains a global concern, especially for youth where developmentally-suited smoking cessation programs are lacking and especially among those not presenting for treatment on their own. We aimed to assess the effectiveness of an avatar-led digitalized smoking cessation intervention (Flexiquit) based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) for young adult smokers at all levels of motivation to quit.

Detailed Description

Cigarette smoking is associated with various health problems, particularly certain forms of cancer and early death (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1997). More recently, smoking has become a global problem among youth and it is imperative that research puts an emphasis on prevention and intervention particularly in this age group (World Health Organization, 2009). Over the past few years, research has shown that internet-based interventions are more cost effective, cater to individuals who are unable/unwilling to attend weekly treatment sessions with a therapist, and are promising in terms of improving attrition rates, a major problem with most treatment trials. Moreover, internet-based interventions use technology often utilized to attract youth (interactive games, animation, video clips etc.) and thus may reach and engage a wider range of individuals than traditional face-to-face interventions. ACT is an empirically-based intervention that uses acceptance and mindfulness strategies and has been shown to increase psychological flexibility. The aim of the present study is to investigate the usefulness and effectiveness of an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) internet-based smoking cessation intervention program for college, high school and vocational school student smokers. Findings are expected to show that a digitalized program designed to engage youth in smoking cessation can result in quitting smoking and has a high applicability potential especially among the hard-to-reach population of youth.

Conditions

Smoking Cessation

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: TREATMENT
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

Waitlist control

Wait-list control group

Group Type: NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Flexiquit

Digital ACT-based intervention for smoking cessation

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Flexiquit

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Digital avatar-led Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for smoking cessation

Interventions

Flexiquit

Digital avatar-led Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for smoking cessation

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Regular smoker (at least 1 cigarette per day)
• Parental consent for those under 18years of age

Exclusion Criteria

• Currently enrolled in another smoking cessation program

• Minimum Eligible Age: 15 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 30 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Sponsors

University of Cyprus

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Maria Karekla

Assistant Professor

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Locations

University of Cyprus

Nicosia, Non-US/Non-Canadian, Cyprus

Site Status: RECRUITING

Countries

Cyprus

Central Contacts

Maria Karekla, PhD

Role: CONTACT

mkarekla@ucy.ac.cy

+35722892100

Facility Contacts

Maria Karekla, PhD

Role: primary

mkarekla@ucy.ac.cy

22892100

Other Identifiers

ΕΕΒΚ/ΕΠ/2013/05

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id