A Brief Online Mindfulness Intervention: An RCT Protocol
- Conditions
- DepressionStressAnxiety
- Interventions
- Behavioral: Psychoeducation onlineBehavioral: A brief (14-day) online mindfulness intervention
- Registration Number
- NCT05882565
- Lead Sponsor
- Ka Yan
- Brief Summary
University students often experience emotional distress that originates from inside or outside academia, and for which treatment would be welcome. Research has shown that mindfulness can help people to reduce stress, anxiety and depression. Furthermore, a thinking style that focuses excessively on negative content (repetitive negative thinking; RNT) has consistently been found to be a mediator of the effects of mindfulness on decreasing stress, anxiety and depression. With this study, we want to 1) investigate the effects of mindfulness on stress, anxiety, depression, and RNT in Indonesian sample of undergraduate students and 2) investigate the mediating role of RNT.
- Detailed Description
Time in university is a generally stressful period of life as a lot of students may face challenges both inside and outside academia. In Indonesia, the majority of undergraduate students (40-80%) reports severe to extremely severe levels of stress, anxiety and depression. Nevertheless, only few young people in Indonesia (\< 5%) receive treatment due to the unavailability of mental healthcare facilities and high treatment costs. In addition, Indonesian students tend to not seek help from others when experiencing mental health problems, as sharing personal or family experiences about mental issues is generally perceived as embarrassing. A meta-analytic review concluded that online mindfulness has a large effect on reducing stress, and a small but significant beneficial impact on depression and anxiety. A recent systematic review showed that a brief online mindfulness intervention can offer positive mental health outcomes (i.e., reduction of stress, anxiety and depressive symptoms) for both clinical and non-clinical samples. Repetitive negative thinking (RNT), defined as a thinking style that focuses excessively on negative content, has consistently been found to be a mediator of the effects of mindfulness on stress reduction and the amelioration of anxiety and/or depressive symptoms. First, this study aims to investigate the effects of a brief (14-day) online mindfulness intervention on stress, anxiety, depressive symptoms and repetitive negative thinking (RNT) in an Indonesian sample of undergraduate students. It is hypothesized that participants in the mindfulness training and active control (psychoeducation) conditions will report less stress, anxiety, depressive symptoms and RNT after the intervention compared to the waitlist control condition. The psychoeducation intervention has the same structure and length as the mindfulness training, but the content differs as it does not involve skills training. Hence, psychoeducation can decrease mental health complaints, but, in line with previous studies, it is hypothesized that it will be less effective in reducing stress, anxiety and depressive symptoms than the mindfulness training. Second, this study aims to investigate the mediating role of RNT. That is, we study whether changes in RNT (i.e., a reduction) serve as a potential working mechanism through which mindfulness achieves its effect. It is hypothesized that RNT mediates the effects of mindfulness on stress, anxiety, and depressive symptoms.
Recruitment & Eligibility
- Status
- RECRUITING
- Sex
- All
- Target Recruitment
- 200
Not provided
Not provided
Study & Design
- Study Type
- INTERVENTIONAL
- Study Design
- PARALLEL
- Arm && Interventions
Group Intervention Description Psychoeducation group Psychoeducation online This is a group that will receive psychoeducation intervention for 14 days. Participants in this group will also be asked baseline, daily and post questions, as well as follow up questions (3months after the intervention). During the intervention, they can fill out an optional daily journal. Mindfuness training group A brief (14-day) online mindfulness intervention This is a group that will receive mindfulness intervention for 14 days. Participants in this group will also be asked baseline, daily and post questions, as well as follow up questions (3 months after the intervention). During the intervention, they can fill out an optional daily journal.
- Primary Outcome Measures
Name Time Method Depression Anxiety Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21; Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995) 2 weeks-3 months DASS-21will be administered to measure depressive symptoms, anxiety and stress. It consists of 21 items that have to be rated on a four-point Likert scale (0 = 'did not apply to me at all' to 4 = 'applied to me very much or most of the time'.
- Secondary Outcome Measures
Name Time Method Mood questions 2 weeks (daily) To be able to check training adherence and training performance, questions regarding context (i.e., (1) Are you in a quiet room at the moment, (2) Are you sitting in a comfortable position with your feet flat on the floor \[for mindfulness training condition only\] and company (i.e., (3) Are you surrounded by company?) will be asked. These questions can be answered with a 'yes' or 'no'.
Momentary repetitive negative thinking 2 weeks (daily) There are five items to assess momentary repetitive negative thinking. These items inquire about thinking patterns related to feelings, problems, worries, recurring thoughts, and being stuck on certain issues. Each question should be answered using a seven-point Likert scale, with responses ranging from 1 = 'never' to 7 = 'every time'.
Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ: Baer et al., 2006) 2 weeks-3 months Change in state mindfulness will be measured using The FFMQ. It includes 39 items, which have to be rated on five-point Likert scale (1 = 'never or very rarely true' to 5 = 'very often or always true'). It includes five components : observing, describing, nonjudging, non reactivity, and acting with awareness.
Perseverative Thinking Questionnaire (PTQ) 2 weeks-3 months Changes in RNT will be measured using The PTQ. The questionnaire (Ehring et al., 2011) is distributed for the trait assessment of repetitive negative thinking, which includes 15-items rated on a five-point Likert scale (1 = 'never' to 5 = 'almost always').
Daily Journal 2 weeks (daily) In order to obtain additional information about participants' experiences, thoughts, feelings or difficulty regarding the intervention, we will ask them to fill out an (optional) daily journal. Participants can write in the journal at the end of the (everyday) training.
Trial Locations
- Locations (1)
Universitas Kristen Maranatha
🇮🇩Bandung, West Java, Indonesia