Writing About Experiences and Health in Older Adults

Status

Completed

Phases

Unknown

Study type

Interventional

Source

ClinicalTrials.gov

Registry ID

NCT02472379

Enrollment

Registered

2015-06-15

Start date

2015-10-01

Completion date

2017-03-01

Last updated

2026-03-18

For informational purposes only — not medical advice. Sourced from public registries and may not reflect the latest updates. Terms

Conditions

Social Psychology

Keywords

Immune System, Behavioral Sciences, Women's Health, Health Psychology, Writing

Brief summary

UCLA researchers looking for healthy females (age 60+) to participate in a study investigating how writing about your experiences may be related to your health. Once a week for 6 weeks, participants will write about their experiences and fill out online questionnaires. Participants will also come to the UCLA campus for blood draws and to fill out questionnaires 3 times: once prior to the 6-week writing period, once immediately after the 6-week period, and once 2-months after the writing period.

Interventions

BEHAVIORALWriting: Group 1

Writing about experiences with familiar individuals in their lives, once a week for 6 weeks.

OTHERWriting: Group 2

Writing about experiences with familiar places, once a week for 6 weeks.

Study design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Intervention model

PARALLEL

Primary purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Masking

DOUBLE (Subject, Investigator)

Eligibility

Sex/Gender

FEMALE

Age

60 Years to 100 Years

Healthy volunteers

Yes

Inclusion criteria

* Healthy adults 60 years and older

Exclusion criteria

* Following a structured telephone interview, participants with the following conditions will not be able to participate: 1. current smokers 2. active, uncontrolled medical disorders 3. chronic infection (e.g., Hepatitis C, HIV) 4. use of certain medications (e.g., hypnotic and psychotropic medication, steroid use, opioid use) 5. psychiatric disorders (e.g., current major depression, bipolar disorder) 6. body mass index (BMI) greater than 35 Other

Design outcomes

Primary

Measure	Time frame	Description
Inflammatory activity	baseline, post 6-week writing period, 2-months post-writing period	Changes in proinflammatory cytokine and proinflammatory gene expression from blood draws
Health and well-being (self-report)	baseline, post 6-week writing period, 2-months post-writing period	Changes in self-report measures of health (e.g., pain, sleep) and well-being (e.g., social support, depression)

Countries

United States

Contacts

PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATORNaomi I. Eisenberger, Ph.D.

University of California, Los Angeles

PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATORMona Moieni, M.A.