Game Intervention for Resilience

NCT ID: NCT07235696

Last Updated: 2025-11-19

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: RECRUITING
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 50 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2025-05-19
• Study Completion Date: 2026-12-20

Brief Summary

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if a game-based intervention can enhance psychological resilience and promote positive affectivity in adults who have experienced major life stress.

The main questions it aims to answer are:

• Does the game-based intervention improve positive affectivity and mental health compared to a waitlist control group immediately after the intervention and at 3-month follow-up?
• Are the mental health benefits of the game-based intervention mediated by improvements in positive affectivity over time?

Researchers will compare the game-based intervention to a waitlist control group to see if the game leads to better emotional and mental health outcomes.

Participants will:

• Be randomly assigned to either the game-based intervention group or the waitlist control group
• Engage with the assigned program for 10 days within two weeks
• Complete psychological assessments before and after the intervention, and again at 3-month follow-up

Conditions

Chronic Stress; Trauma Exposure; Resilience, Psychological; Major Life Stress

Study Design

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

Study Groups

Game-based intervention

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Game-based Intervention

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

This intervention is a two-week game-based program designed to enhance psychological resilience and positive affectivity in individuals who have experienced major life stress. The game incorporates emotionally engaging features such as reward mechanisms, adaptive challenge levels, and implicit emotion-regulation cues. Unlike traditional psychoeducation or mindfulness-based interventions, this program uses interactive gameplay to target affective and cognitive processes associated with resilience.

Waitlist control

Group Type: NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

Game-based Intervention

This intervention is a two-week game-based program designed to enhance psychological resilience and positive affectivity in individuals who have experienced major life stress. The game incorporates emotionally engaging features such as reward mechanisms, adaptive challenge levels, and implicit emotion-regulation cues. Unlike traditional psychoeducation or mindfulness-based interventions, this program uses interactive gameplay to target affective and cognitive processes associated with resilience.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• fluency in oral and written Cantonese or Mandarin;
• having experienced at least one major life stress in the recent 5 years (assessed by the Life Stress Index);
• normal or corrected-to-normal vision and hearing.

Exclusion Criteria

• formal diagnosis of any major psychiatric illnesses or history of suicidal behaviour;
• major physical illness, neurological condition or traumatic brain injury;
• Intake of medication within the previous 6 months that may affect emotion or cognitive functions;
• pregnancy (for women);
• prior experience with any commercial computer repair simulation game.

• Minimum Eligible Age: 23 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 35 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

The University of Hong Kong

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Zhengxi Shao

Associate Professor

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Locations

The University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong, , Hong Kong

Site Status: RECRUITING

Countries

Hong Kong

Central Contacts

Associate Professor, Principle Investigator

Role: CONTACT

rshao@hku.hk

+852-3917-8927

Other Identifiers

EA250229

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id