Testing the Causal Effects of a Civic Engagement Intervention on Health and Wellbeing Among Youth (I-ACTED)

NCT ID: NCT04514133

Last Updated: 2025-12-23

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: RECRUITING
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 2500 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2021-06-24
• Study Completion Date: 2026-01-31

Brief Summary

The purpose of this research is to understand how participating or not participating in an action civics curriculum may affect the health and wellbeing of young people. Participants will be chosen from students who attend certain schools that choose to participate in the action civics curriculum. Participation in this research involves completing surveys during class time in the Spring and Fall 2021-2022 semesters and then completing online surveys outside of class in the future.

Detailed Description

Equal access to civic resources, such as opportunities for civic engagement and connections to one's community, are an important part of a culture of health. Meaningful experiences in civic engagement and community connectedness are transformative for young people - especially for youth from marginalized backgrounds, who often feel voiceless and excluded from decision-making in civic and social institutions. Theories and correlational evidence point to positive associations between civic engagement (e.g., volunteering, voting, and feelings of civic empowerment) and better mental, physical, and behavioral health and wellbeing. Meaningful civic engagement experiences may have an especially powerful effect on health and wellbeing for those from traditionally marginalized backgrounds. However, causal pathways between civic interventions, civic outcomes, and health and wellbeing outcomes among are not firmly established. Further, how civic engagement and sense of community affect health and wellbeing outcomes are unknown, and questions remain about for whom these effects may be especially beneficial. In this study, we ask whether an established civic intervention called Action Civics affects civic engagement and sense of community, and subsequently affects health and wellbeing among youth. To build on these observational findings, the study team will: (a) examine the causal links between youth civic engagement and sense of community and health, and (b) test whether an established school-based, civic engagement intervention can affect individual health and wellbeing and equity outcomes.

Conditions

Mental Health Wellness 1; Social Interaction; Health Attitude

Keywords

civic engagement; health; social wellbeing; behavioral health

Study Design

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

Study Groups

Action Civics program

Students in this arm will take part in an Action Civics (AC) program. AC delivers action civics programming to young people from diverse backgrounds nationwide. AC offers a school-based action civics curriculum in which classes collectively choose a local issue, learn strategies and skills for taking civic action, develop an action plan, and take action on their selected local issue. Students, as a class, tackle topics ranging from health-related (e.g., health of school lunches) to safety-related (e.g. lack of crosswalks) to community social issues (e.g., community-police relations).

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Participating in Action Civics program

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Students in school classrooms participating in Action Civics program

No Action Civics program

Students in this arm will receive no intervention.

Group Type: NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

Participating in Action Civics program

Students in school classrooms participating in Action Civics program

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Currently enrolled Middle or High School student
• Enrolled in a course with a teacher from a school participating in the study

• Minimum Eligible Age: 10 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 20 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

OTHER

Sponsor Role: collaborator

Wake Forest University Health Sciences

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Principal Investigators

Parissa J Ballard, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Assistant Professor

Locations

Wake Forest School of Medicine

Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States

Site Status: RECRUITING

Countries

United States

Central Contacts

Parissa J Ballard, PhD

Role: CONTACT

Phone: 336-716-0793

Email: pballard@wakehealth.edu

Grisel Trejo, MPH

Role: CONTACT

Phone: 336-716-2830

Email: gtrejo@wakehealth.edu

Facility Contacts

Parissa J Ballard, PhD

Role: primary

Taylor J Arnold, MA

Role: backup

References

Ballard PJ, Cohen AK, Littenberg-Tobias J. Action Civics for Promoting Civic Development: Main Effects of Program Participation and Differences by Project Characteristics. Am J Community Psychol. 2016 Dec;58(3-4):377-390. doi: 10.1002/ajcp.12103.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 27982470 (View on PubMed)

Ballard PJ, Hoyt LT, Pachucki MC. Impacts of Adolescent and Young Adult Civic Engagement on Health and Socioeconomic Status in Adulthood. Child Dev. 2019 Jul;90(4):1138-1154. doi: 10.1111/cdev.12998. Epub 2018 Jan 23.

Reference Type: BACKGROUND

PMID: 29359473 (View on PubMed)

Cohen AK, Fitzgerald JC, Trejo G, Yalif IU, Wesson PD, Wolfson M, Ballard PJ. The I-ACTED study (investigating action civics training through an experimental design): a cluster randomized controlled trial of a school-based action civics education intervention on adolescent wellbeing. BMC Public Health. 2025 Oct 16;25(1):3513. doi: 10.1186/s12889-025-24838-y.

Reference Type: DERIVED

PMID: 41102741 (View on PubMed)

Other Identifiers

IRB00066103

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id