acrophobia and fear of heights
Conditions
Interventions
The intervention 0-phobia is 3-week self-help virtual reality (VR) exposure
therapy for fear of heights, that is delivered through a smartphone application
(app) in combination with rudimentary card
Sponsors
Vrije Universiteit
Eligibility
Age
18 Years to 99 Years
Inclusion criteria
Inclusion criteria: -scoring above 45.45 on the AQ-Anxiety -are between 18-64 years old -have access to a smart phone (Android) and internet -willing to participate in the research study and providing informed consent -willing to fill in questionnaires (4 times)
Exclusion criteria
Exclusion criteria: A potential subject who meets any of the following criteria will be excluded from participation in this study: -present with symptoms of severe depression or suicidality respectively as measured with the PHQ-9; total score > 19 or a score 3 on the suicidal ideation question of the WSQ (Donker et al. 2009) -have insufficient knowledge of the Dutch language -are under current treatment for specific phobia or psychotropic medication (unless on stable dosage for the previous 3 months and no changes planned during the study period)
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame |
|---|---|
| The main parameter will be the Acrophobia Questionnaire (AQ, Cohen; 1977) subscale anxiety, a 20-item self-report questionnaire to measure fear of heights (fear and avoidance). The 20-item anxiety subscale has a 7-point Likert scale (*not anxious* to *extremely anxious*), total score 0-120. The questionnaire is widely-used and has good psychometric properties (Cohen, 1977). This measure will be given at baseline, post-test and follow-up and takes 5 minutes to complete. To be considered for inclusion, individuals have to score at least a 45.45 on the AQ-Anxiety (one standard deviation below the mean of a previous acrophobic sample; Cohen, 1972; Steinman and Teachman, 2011) | — |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame |
|---|---|
| Secondary parameters are: * The Attitudes Towards Heights Questionnaire (ATHQ; originally Abelson & Curtis, 1989, with minor modifications to the wording reported in Coehlo, Santos, Silvério, & Silva, 2006) is a 6-item measure in which individuals read pairs of dichotomous adjectives describing ways people may feel about heights (e.g., *Good/Bad,* *Safe/Dangerous*), and rate how they feel about elevated places on a scale of 0 (which corresponds with the first adjective) to 10 (which corresponds with the second adjective). The ATHQ has been used in several height fear treatment studies and is sensitive to treatment effects (Coehlo et al., 2006; Emmelkamp, Bruynzeel, Drost, & van der Mast, 2001). Reliability is good (Steinman & Teachman, 2014). * Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI; Beck et al., 1988) is a 21-item self-report questionnaire assessing symptoms of anxiety. Patients record how much they have been bothered by each symptom during the past week, including the day the questionnaire is administered. Each item is rated on a 4-point Likert scale ranging from 0 = not at all to 3 = severely: I could barely stand it. The total score ranges from 0 to 63. The following guidelines are recommended for the interpretation of scores: 0*9, normal or no anxiety; 10*18, mild to moderate anxiety; 19*29, moderate to severe anxiety; and 30*63, severe anxiety. Internal consistency is high (0.90-0.94) and convergent validity is good (Brown et al., 1997). * Igroup Presence Questionnaire (IPQ; Schubert, Friedmann and Regenbrecht 2001), a 14-item questionnaire which assess realism and *presence* in the VR environment. Each of the items has five response categories from fully disagree (1) to fully agree (5). Chronbach`s alpha is good (* = .73). This questionnaire will be completed at post-test. * System Usability Scale (SUS; Bangor et al., 2008): 10 items about user friendliness of the online intervention. The SUS is composed of 10 statements that are scored on a | — |
Countries
Netherlands
Outcome results
None listed