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Psychological Intervention for Misophonia

Psychological Intervention for Misophonia

Status
Active, not recruiting
Phases
NA
Study type
Interventional
Source
ClinicalTrials.gov
Registry ID
NCT05601284
Enrollment
60
Registered
2022-11-01
Start date
2022-10-24
Completion date
2026-04-30
Last updated
2024-07-26

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

Conditions

Misophonia

Brief summary

The investigators are proposing to test Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)+ traditional audiological behavioral intervention as an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach for the assessment and treatment of misophonia. Participants will be 60 adults with misophonia and will be randomly assigned to receive 12 sessions of ACT+behavioral intervention or receive 12 weeks of progressive relaxation training+psychoeducation (PRT; a commonly used active control condition) after undergoing a comprehensive psychological and audiological evaluation.

Detailed description

Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is a promising psychotherapy for supporting traditional behavioral methods for treating misophonia, but has not been previously tested. ACT teaches skills to develop acceptance, mindfulness, and defusion from difficult internal experiences while increasing connections with personal values and encouraging meaningful behavioral changes. This study will help determine if ACT+behavioral intervention is a feasible and acceptable treatment for misophonia, help clarify active psychological mechanisms of misophonia, and determine whether or not this combination of services can effectively help individuals diagnosed with misophonia.

Interventions

BEHAVIORALAcceptance and commitment therapy

ACT teaches skills to develop acceptance, mindfulness, and defusion from difficult internal experiences while increasing connections with personal values and encouraging meaningful behavioral changes. ACT for misophonia combines core ACT processes with a traditional audiological behavioral intervention for a integrated, multi-disciplinary approach for the assessment and treatment of misophonia. Treatment begins with a brief focus on the behavioral intervention, followed by the teaching of ACT skills to support the use of the behavioral methods. The intervention consists of 12 total individual sessions of ACT+behavioral management.

PRT for misophonia consists of basic psychoeducation for misophonia followed by PRT. PRT involves learning to tense and relax muscles. Early sessions focus on tensing and relaxing smaller muscle groups, while later sessions focus on larger muscle groups. Final sessions focus on relaxation as produced by recalling previous relaxation and a review of skills learned. PRT consists of 12 individual total sessions.

Sponsors

Utah State University
Lead SponsorOTHER

Study design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
DOUBLE (Subject, Outcomes Assessor)

Eligibility

Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No

Inclusion criteria

* Individuals seeking treatment for misophonia. * Meet clinical cut-off for misphonia (minimum score of five on the Misophonia Questionnaire). * Stable on psychotropic medication for at least 30 days. * English speaking.

Exclusion criteria

* Presence of psychological and/or neurological impairments that would preclude someone from participating in the study or exceed misophonia as the primary presenting problem (e.g. active self-harm or need for treatment for psychosis).

Design outcomes

Primary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Misophonia Questionnaire9-12 monthsSelf-report of misophonia symptoms. There are two subscales. The first subscale (misophonia symptoms) ranges from 0 to 76 and the second (misophonia severity) ranges from 1 to 15. For both subscales, higher scores indicate worse outcomes.

Countries

United States

Outcome results

None listed

Source: ClinicalTrials.gov · Data processed: Feb 4, 2026