Can Exposure to Inclusive Virtual Art Decrease Pain and Social Disconnection Among Individuals Living With Chronic Pain?

NCT ID: NCT05310747

Last Updated: 2025-04-23

Study Results

Results pending

The study team has not published outcome measurements, participant flow, or safety data for this trial yet. Check back later for updates.

Basic Information

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Recruitment Status

COMPLETED

Clinical Phase

NA

Total Enrollment

311 participants

Study Classification

INTERVENTIONAL

Study Start Date

2022-10-07

Study Completion Date

2023-01-06

Brief Summary

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The proposed study is an experimental intervention to test for the effects of exposure to art by means of a virtual museum visit. It examines the fundamental question of whether exposure to virtual art can alleviate pain. Google Arts \& Culture has digitized the collections of over 2,000 museums, art galleries, and other cultural institutions. The platform is free and allows 'visitors' to explore art from around the world. For this study, the PIs have chosen artwork from this collection and created a virtual museum gallery such that research participants will visit the museum with or without art (i.e., we will remove all art from the virtual galleries). In addition, we hypothesize that individuals primed to experience social connection prior to art exposure will experience lower perceived social disconnection and pain than those who are not primed.

Detailed Description

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Research Design: 2 (virtual artwork exposure: present, absent) x 2 (prime: social connection prime: high, low) factorial experiment with a hanging control group (4 cells plus 1 control group, for a total of 5 cells) and 2 repeated measures. A priori power analysis using G\*Power showed that the required sample size for a 5-group repeated measures experiment with 2 measurement times with 1-B error probability = .80 that expected small effect with a size of d = .10 and a significance level of p = .05 was a total of 305 participants (61 participants per cell).

Eligible individuals will be offered informed consent documentation via the StudyPages platform and then will be randomized to their study group:

1. Artwork present + Social connection prime high
2. Artwork present + Social connection prime low
3. Artwork absent + Social connection prime high
4. Artwork absent + Social connection prime low
5. Hanging control group - no exposure to any independent variables (i.e. artwork: present or absent; social connection prime: high or low)

Participants will fill out pre-intervention scales (pain intensity and unpleasantness; perceived social disconnection) prior to their virtual museum experience. Participants will then visit a virtual art museum gallery for 10 minutes or receive no exposure if they are in the hanging control group. In the artwork present condition, the virtual museum will feature paintings as part of an exhibition. In the artwork absent condition, paintings will be removed and thus the virtual museum will be empty. In the high social connection prime condition participants will be assigned to write an essay about a person and situation that made them feel valued, seen, and heard. In the low social connection prime condition participants will be assigned to write about a person and situation that made them feel ignored and not very valued. After 10 minutes within their condition participants will complete a post-intervention survey.

In addition, written responses to the social connection primes and museum visit data (e.g., user movement, object interaction, and perceptions about artwork in the museum) will be collected and analyzed.

Conditions

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Chronic Pain Social Disconnection

Study Design

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Allocation Method

RANDOMIZED

Intervention Model

FACTORIAL

Eligible individuals will be randomized to one of 4 groups:

1. Artwork present + Social connection prime high
2. Artwork present + Social connection prime low
3. Artwork absent + Social connection prime high
4. Artwork absent + Social connection prime low
5. Hanging control group - no exposure to any independent variables (i.e. artwork: present or absent; social connection prime: high or low)
Primary Study Purpose

TREATMENT

Blinding Strategy

TRIPLE

Participants Investigators Outcome Assessors

Study Groups

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Artwork present + social connection high

Individuals participate in an exercise to prime a feeling of high social connection and then explore a virtual museum exhibit with artwork for 10 minutes

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Artwork present

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

A virtual museum exhibit with a curated selection of artworks

Social connection high

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Participants will identify a person from their life that makes them feel socially connected and then write (1) about that person and (2) an experience they had with that person that made them feel socially connected.

Artwork present + social connection low

Individuals participate in an exercise to prime a feeling of low social connection and then explore a virtual museum exhibit with artwork for 10 minutes

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Artwork present

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

A virtual museum exhibit with a curated selection of artworks

Social connection low

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Participants will identify a person from their life that makes them feel socially disconnected and then write (1) about that person and (2) an experience they had with that person that made them feel socially disconnected.

Artwork absent + social connection high

Individuals participate in an exercise to prime a feeling of high social connection and then explore a virtual museum exhibit with no artwork for 10 minutes

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Artwork absent

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

The same virtual museum exhibit space as the 'Artwork present' condition but with all of the artworks removed from the walls

Social connection high

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Participants will identify a person from their life that makes them feel socially connected and then write (1) about that person and (2) an experience they had with that person that made them feel socially connected.

Artwork absent + social connection low

Individuals participate in an exercise to prime a feeling of low social connection and then explore a virtual museum exhibit with no artwork for 10 minutes

Group Type ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Artwork absent

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

The same virtual museum exhibit space as the 'Artwork present' condition but with all of the artworks removed from the walls

Social connection low

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Participants will identify a person from their life that makes them feel socially disconnected and then write (1) about that person and (2) an experience they had with that person that made them feel socially disconnected.

Hanging control group

Individuals will receive no exposure to any independent variables (i.e. artwork: present or absent; social connection prime: high or low) for 10 minutes before completing their final survey.

Group Type NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

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Artwork present

A virtual museum exhibit with a curated selection of artworks

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Artwork absent

The same virtual museum exhibit space as the 'Artwork present' condition but with all of the artworks removed from the walls

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Social connection high

Participants will identify a person from their life that makes them feel socially connected and then write (1) about that person and (2) an experience they had with that person that made them feel socially connected.

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Social connection low

Participants will identify a person from their life that makes them feel socially disconnected and then write (1) about that person and (2) an experience they had with that person that made them feel socially disconnected.

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

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Inclusion Criteria

* read and write in English language
* chronic moderate to severe pain (≥ 6 months in duration; ≥ 4 in response to the question, "on average this week my pain intensity has been?" on a 0-10 NRS)
* lonely (≥ 4 on the 3-item Loneliness Scale)
* access to an electronic device with internet connection in order to participate in the study

Exclusion Criteria

* dementia
* adults unable to consent
Minimum Eligible Age

18 Years

Eligible Sex

ALL

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Sponsors

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University of California, Davis

OTHER

Sponsor Role lead

Responsible Party

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Responsibility Role SPONSOR

Locations

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University of California, Davis

Sacramento, California, United States

Site Status

Countries

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United States

Other Identifiers

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1811205

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id

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