Anxiety, Depression, Mobile Phone Use, Stress, Psychological
Conditions
Keywords
Depression, Anxiety, Stress, mHealth, college students
Brief summary
The goal of this pilot study is to examine the feasibility of the prototype C-STRESS app with 3 college students from UCI with clinically significant depression (scored ≥ 10 on the Patient Health Questionnaire-9). The main question it aims to answer is: whether the prototype C-STRESS is useful for college students to manage daily stress and depression symptoms. Participants were asked to use the C-STRESS app daily for 6 weeks to participate in CBCT lessons, watch guided meditation videos, complete short reflective exercises, and engage with other content provided in C-STRESS (i.e., attending drop-in sessions, journaling, completing mood and wellbeing check-ins, and reading educational articles on depression, anxiety, and stress). At the end of week 3 and 6, participants completed 6 online surveys (System Usability Scale, Technology Acceptance Model, Patient Health Questionnaire-9, General Anxiety Disorder-7, Health Related Quality of Life-4, and Brief-COPE) to assess C-STRESS's usability/feasibility and changes in depressive symptoms and coping styles over the study period.
Detailed description
More than half of U.S. college students experience significant symptoms of depression, anxiety or stress, and three-fourths of these college students do not obtain professional help due to overburdened mental health services at universities and colleges. Prevalence of mental disorders and inadequate utilization of mental health services is a particularly severe problem for minority students and community college students. Cognitively Based Compassion Training (CBCT) has been administered to a variety of populations, including college students (undergraduate students, medical school students) and younger adolescents in prior completed studies, that collectively showed that CBCT can significantly strengthen cognitive resilience to stress and substantially reduce depressive symptoms, stress-associated systemic inflammation, improve emotional regulation (including impulse control) and mindfulness; increase compassion, and improve empathetic accuracy (measured by fMRI) - a critical skill that aims at cultivating relationships and connection to others. Currently, as a face-to-face program, CBCT certification at Emory takes 1 year to complete, and there are only 48 CBCT instructors. Due to the course duration, location, and time-intensive requirement for certification, CBCT has limited reach and scalability in its current instructional model despite growing demands. The research team developed C-STRESS, a digital treatment intervention that leverages CBCT to improve the mental health of college students. C-STRESS adapts the traditional intervention modality (face-to-face) of CBCT in the form of micro-learning and provides personalization options including virtual companions and an animated visual cue of growing a garden to promote student engagement. Using co-design sessions with college students, the research team developed other features in C-STRESS to address the target population's needs when it comes to using a mobile app for mental health care, including an audiovisual library of guided meditation and resources, journaling, virtual drop-ins with CBCT instructors, mood and wellbeing tracking, and crisis helpline. The research team recruited an independent convenience sample of 3 UCI undergraduate and graduate students to pilot test the initial content (introduction and modules 0-3) of the prototype C-STRESS mobile application. Participants completed measures via REDCap. Once enrolled, participants met with a member of the research team via Zoom to a) download the prototype app, b) complete app orientation (eg. indicate reason(s) for using the app, indicate color scheme & frequency of notification preferences, select avatar if desired, etc.), c) begin to explore the app and its functionality with a research team member available to provide technical assistance, and d) complete the System Usability Scale and Technology Acceptance Model questionnaires via REDCap survey link. After the app orientation, participants were asked to use the prototype C-STRESS application at least once per day for 6 weeks. Daily usage ranged from approximately 2 minutes (opening the app and performing a one-minute meditation) to as much time as the participant desires (opening the app, completing available content, and unlimited meditation/reflection/journaling, etc. multiple times per day). At the end of week 3 (timepoint 1) and week 6 (timepoint 2), the participants were asked to complete measures via REDCap survey to assess C-STRESS's usability/feasibility and changes in depressive symptoms and coping styles over the 6-week study period.
Interventions
DEVICEC-STRESS
Participants were asked to use the C-STRESS app daily for 6 weeks to participate in Cognitively Based Compassion Training (CBCT) lessons, watch guided meditation videos, complete short reflective exercises, and engage with other content provided in C-STRESS (i.e., attending drop-in sessions, journaling, completing mood and wellbeing check-ins, and reading educational articles on depression, anxiety, and stress)
Sponsors
University of California, Irvine
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Benten Technologies, Inc.
Study design
Allocation
NA
Intervention model
SINGLE_GROUP
Primary purpose
DEVICE_FEASIBILITY
Masking
NONE
Intervention model description
All participants enrolled in the study were asked to use the C-STRESS app daily for 6 weeks.
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to 30 Years
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* Undergraduate or graduate students * Enrolled at University of California Irvine (UCI) * Between the ages of 18-30 * Speak and understand English * Have access to the internet for 6 weeks to participate in study activities via Zoom * Report clinically significant depression (scores ≥ 10 on the Patient Health Questionnaire-9) * Have a smart phone with either iPhone Operating System (iOS) or android operating system
Exclusion criteria
* Report active suicidal ideation unless they obtain a written note of approval from a psychiatric provider * Female student who self-report pregnancy or plans to become pregnant within the next 3 months
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Change From Baseline System Usability Scale Scores at Week 3 and Week 6 | Baseline, week 3 | The System Usability Scale (SUS) is a reliable assessment tool for evaluating the perceived usability and ease of use of a product or service. The scale comprises ten questions, each with five possible responses, ranging from 1 (Strongly disagree) to 5 (Strongly agree). The participant's response to each question is converted to a score, added together and then multiplied by 2.5 to convert their original responses to a score of 0-100. A higher score indicates higher perceived usability and ease of use of a product or service. SUS was assessed at both the baseline and week 3. However, there was no assessment of SUS in week 6 due to grant termination. |
Countries
United States
Participant flow
Recruitment details
Participants were recruited via print, email, or electronic posting of flyer on UCI websites or affiliated social media and locations in and around UCI campus from March 16 to May 31, 2022. All three participants were enrolled on May 04, 2022. Due to grant termination, final collection of data for the primary outcome was on May 25, 2022, which allowed us to collect data at baseline and week 3, but not perform data collection at week 6 due to grant termination.
Pre-assignment details
All participants were assigned to the C-STRESS arm. Participants who reported active suicidal ideation and female students who self-reported pregnant or plans to become pregnant within the next 3 months were excluded.
Participants by arm
| Arm | Count |
|---|---|
| C-STRESS Participants were asked to use the C-STRESS app daily for 6 weeks to participate in CBCT lessons, watch guided meditation videos, complete short reflective exercises, and engage with other content provided in C-STRESS (i.e., attending drop-in sessions, journaling, completing mood and wellbeing check-ins, and reading educational articles on depression, anxiety, and stress) | 3 |
| Total | 3 |
Withdrawals & dropouts
| Period | Reason | FG000 |
|---|---|---|
| Overall Study | Covid delays and grant termination without continuation. | 3 |
Baseline characteristics
| Characteristic | C-STRESS |
|---|---|
| Age, Continuous | 24.67 years STANDARD_DEVIATION 1.89 |
| Race (NIH/OMB) American Indian or Alaska Native | 0 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Asian | 0 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Black or African American | 1 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) More than one race | 1 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander | 0 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Unknown or Not Reported | 0 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) White | 1 Participants |
| Region of Enrollment United States | 3 participants |
| Sex: Female, Male Female | 3 Participants |
| Sex: Female, Male Male | 0 Participants |
| System Usability Scale | 54.58 score on a scale STANDARD_DEVIATION 20.59 |
Adverse events
| Event type | EG000 affected / at risk |
|---|---|
| deaths Total, all-cause mortality | 0 / 3 |
| other Total, other adverse events | 0 / 3 |
| serious Total, serious adverse events | 0 / 3 |
Outcome results
Primary
Change From Baseline System Usability Scale Scores at Week 3 and Week 6
The System Usability Scale (SUS) is a reliable assessment tool for evaluating the perceived usability and ease of use of a product or service. The scale comprises ten questions, each with five possible responses, ranging from 1 (Strongly disagree) to 5 (Strongly agree). The participant's response to each question is converted to a score, added together and then multiplied by 2.5 to convert their original responses to a score of 0-100. A higher score indicates higher perceived usability and ease of use of a product or service. SUS was assessed at both the baseline and week 3. However, there was no assessment of SUS in week 6 due to grant termination.
Time frame: Baseline, week 3
| Arm | Measure | Group | Value (MEAN) | Dispersion |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| C-STRESS | Change From Baseline System Usability Scale Scores at Week 3 and Week 6 | Milestone 1 (week 1): Completion of the C-STRESS app orientation session and the SUS questionnaire | 71.67 score on a scale | Standard Deviation 11.61 |
| C-STRESS | Change From Baseline System Usability Scale Scores at Week 3 and Week 6 | Milestone 2: Completion of the SUS questionnaire at week 3 | 37.5 score on a scale | Standard Deviation 11.37 |
| C-STRESS | Change From Baseline System Usability Scale Scores at Week 3 and Week 6 | Change from baseline SUS scores at week 3 | 34.17 score on a scale | Standard Deviation 20.45 |
p-value: <0.0595% CI: [-28.04, 96.37]t-test, 2 sided