A Brief Acceptance Intervention for Stress to Improve Students' Well-Being

NCT ID: NCT06335615

Last Updated: 2024-03-28

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 116 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2023-11-27
• Study Completion Date: 2023-12-19

Brief Summary

The goal of this randomized controlled trial is to test a brief psychological intervention that focusses on acceptance of stress in a student population. The main questions it aims to answer are:

• Does this brief acceptance intervention increase the well-being of students in the short term?
• By which mechanisms does this effect occur?
• What are moderating factors of this effect?

Half of the participants follow a one-hour intervention, which includes

• psychoeducation and metaphors about stress and how acceptance can help to deal with it
• experiential exercises
• mindfulness meditation
• mindfulness homework practice

Students that receive the intervention will be compared to students that merely received psychoeducation about stress and acceptance to see if the intervention lead to larger increases in well-being.

Conditions

Stress

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: TREATMENT
• Blinding Strategy: SINGLE

Study Groups

Intervention

The intervention group follows a one-hour in-person intervention focused on acceptance of stress. Each participant follows this intervention individually.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Brief Acceptance Intervention

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

The intervention consist of explanations and exercises about acceptance of stress. The intervention starts with a welcome, after which participants do jumping jacks and then breath through a straw to induce an uncomfortable experience. Next, a Chinese finger trap is used to show the automatic, but often not useful, reaction to avoid stress. Participants then watch a short video that introduces the concept of acceptance, and they do a short, guided meditation. Afterwards, they do the straw exercise again, but this time with instruction to examine and allow uncomfortable experiences. The session ends with a recap and the introduction of the home exercise. Participants install an app that reminds them every hour to do a three-second meditation in which they pay attention to their breathing and body in an accepting way.

Control

The control group follows a 20-minute online psychoeducation at home. Each participant follows this intervention individually.

Group Type: ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Psychoeducation

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

In the psychoeducation, participants learn about the stress response, mindfulness, and acceptance. For this, they are guided through a vignette about a student who struggles with stress and then develops a more accepting stance towards it. The psychoeducation explains how acceptance can help to deal with stress but does not instruct participants to apply this in their own life.

Interventions

Brief Acceptance Intervention

The intervention consist of explanations and exercises about acceptance of stress. The intervention starts with a welcome, after which participants do jumping jacks and then breath through a straw to induce an uncomfortable experience. Next, a Chinese finger trap is used to show the automatic, but often not useful, reaction to avoid stress. Participants then watch a short video that introduces the concept of acceptance, and they do a short, guided meditation. Afterwards, they do the straw exercise again, but this time with instruction to examine and allow uncomfortable experiences. The session ends with a recap and the introduction of the home exercise. Participants install an app that reminds them every hour to do a three-second meditation in which they pay attention to their breathing and body in an accepting way.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Psychoeducation

In the psychoeducation, participants learn about the stress response, mindfulness, and acceptance. For this, they are guided through a vignette about a student who struggles with stress and then develops a more accepting stance towards it. The psychoeducation explains how acceptance can help to deal with stress but does not instruct participants to apply this in their own life.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Student at the University of Amsterdam in the Bachelor's programme psychology or communication science

Exclusion Criteria

• Panic Disorder as measured with the Rapid Measurement Toolkit-20 (Batterham et al., 2020; cutoff at 9)
• Asthma, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), another lung disease (including covid-related lung complaints), or tightness of chest
• Pregnancy
• Physical disability that limits ability to move and jump

• Minimum Eligible Age: 17 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 29 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Sponsors

VU University of Amsterdam

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Jaap Lancee

Assistant Professor

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Locations

University of Amsterdam

Amsterdam, North Holland, Netherlands

Countries

Netherlands

Other Identifiers

FMG-5790_2023

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id