The purpose of this study is to examine participant adherence to intervention feasibility and acceptability of intervention, attention control, and implementation strategy.
A 1:1 pilot randomized controlled trial of the SOVA Peer Ambassador Program compared to attention control: brief psychoeducational independent assignments (i.e. reading SOVA articles and responding to open-ended questions without content creation and without peer interaction) (N=40) and evaluate feasibility of implementation strategy.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
Masking
SINGLE
Enrollment
12
The SOVA Ambassador intervention includes: adolescents will have access to the website specifically for adolescents: sova.pitt.edu These anonymous websites aim to: (1) challenge negative health beliefs and increase depression/anxiety knowledge through daily blog posts enhanced with peer commentary; (2) promote social support through online peer interactions; and (3) encourage parent-adolescent mental health communication through same day blog posts with questions for discussion. Participants that receive this intervention will contribute monthly articles and regular comments.
Participant will be given an article from the sova.pitt.edu website and a prompt to write about privately.
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States
Feasibility of Intervention
Average number of articles written per participant; Research team extract data from websites and observation notes
Time frame: 12 weeks
Feasibility of Control Arm
Average number of submissions to questions on the REDCap form per participant in the Attention control arm Research team extract data from REDCap
Time frame: 12 weeks
Acceptability of Intervention
Acceptability of Intervention Measure; Open-ended question (asked the SOVA Website meets my approval)
Time frame: 12 weeks
Acceptability of Implementation Strategy
Open-ended question: How acceptable to you was it to participate in this program? (referring to mental health program used as an implementation strategy) asked at baseline
Time frame: Baseline
Acceptability of Randomization
Single item open-ended question inquiring how acceptable it was to being randomly chosen to participate in the SOVA Ambassador arm versus the control arm
Time frame: 12 weeks
Depression Severity
Patient Health Questionnaire-9 measures depression severity a higher score indicating greater severity. The PHQ-8 version was used with the 9th item omitted, score range is 0 to 24
Time frame: 6 weeks
Depression Severity
Patient Health Questionnaire-9 measures depression severity a higher score indicating greater severity. The PHQ-8 version was used with the 9th item omitted, score range is 0 to 24
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Time frame: 12 weeks
Anxiety Severity
Generalized Anxiety Disorders 7-item Questionnaire measures extent of anxiety symptoms. The total score ranges from 0 to 21 with a higher score indicating greater severity.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Anxiety Severity
Generalized Anxiety Disorders 7-item Questionnaire measures extent of anxiety symptoms. The total score ranges from 0 to 21 with a higher score indicating greater severity.
Time frame: 12 weeks
Resilience/Positive Youth Development
Positive Youth Development will be assessed using The Positive Youth Development Very Short Form (PYD-VSF). The confidence subscale is reported which has 3 items with a total score ranging from 3 to 13 (α = 0.78), a higher score associated with a greater level of confidence.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Resilience/Positive Youth Development
Positive Youth Development will be assessed using The Positive Youth Development Very Short Form (PYD-VSF). The confidence subscale is reported which has 3 items with a total score ranging from 3 to 13 (α = 0.78), a higher score associated with a greater level of confidence.
Time frame: 12 weeks
Self-Esteem
The 10-item Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) (α = 0.93) will be administered to assess participants' self-esteem. Items on the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale ask about self-worth and self-acceptance and are scored using a four-point scale from 1 = strongly disagree, to 4 = strongly agree. The scores on each question are summed together, with higher scores indicating greater self-esteem. Scores range from 10-40 with a higher score equating to higher self esteem.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Self-Esteem
The 10-item Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) (α = 0.93) will be administered to assess participants' self-esteem. Items on the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale ask about self-worth and self-acceptance and are scored using a four-point scale from 1 = strongly disagree, to 4 = strongly agree. The scores on each question are summed together, with higher scores indicating greater self-esteem. Scores range from 10-40
Time frame: 12 weeks
Emotional Self-Efficacy
Emotional self-efficacy will be assessed using The Mental Health Self-Efficacy Scale (MHSES) (α = 0.82) Clarke 2014. MHSES was developed according to guidelines by Bandura as to how to create self-efficacy questionnaires (Bandura, 2006) . The questionnaire contains six items asking about the participant's confidence level in performing mental health self-care behaviors. Scoring of the MHSES is based on a 10-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ("Not at all confident") to 10 ("Totally confident"). Scores are a mean score ranging 1-10 with higher scores meaning higher mental health self-efficacy.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Emotional Self-Efficacy
Emotional self-efficacy will be assessed using The Mental Health Self-Efficacy Scale (MHSES) (α = 0.82) Clarke 2014. MHSES was developed according to guidelines by Bandura as to how to create self-efficacy questionnaires (Bandura, 2006) . The questionnaire contains six items asking about the participant's confidence level in performing mental health self-care behaviors. Scoring of the MHSES is based on a 10-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ("Not at all confident") to 10 ("Totally confident"). Scores are a mean score ranging 1-10 with higher scores meaning higher mental health self-efficacy.
Time frame: 12 weeks
Social Support
The Medical Outcome Study Social Support Scale measures types of social support. Higher levels associated with greater support. We will use the emotional/informational subscale from this report and calculate the mean per item score on a range of 1 to 5.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Social Support
The Medical Outcome Study Social Support Scale measures types of social support. Higher levels associated with greater support. We will use the emotional/informational subscale from this report and calculate the mean per item score on a range of 1 to 5.
Time frame: 12 weeks
Social Isolation
The revised UCLA Loneliness Scale will be administered to all participants to measure social isolation (α = 0.93). This 20-item scale measures one's feelings of social isolation and is scored using a four-point scale (1 = never; 2 = rarely; 3 = sometimes; 4 = often) . Score range 20-80, higher score is higher isolation.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Social Isolation
The revised UCLA Loneliness Scale will be administered to all participants to measure social isolation (α = 0.93). This 20-item scale measures one's feelings of social isolation and is scored using a four-point scale (1 = never; 2 = rarely; 3 = sometimes; 4 = often) . Score range 20-80, higher score is higher isolation.
Time frame: 12 weeks
Stigma
The Depression Stigma Scale measures stigmatizing attitudes toward depression treatment. It is a continuous measure and the total score ranges from 0-36. There are two subscales: the personal stigma subscale which totals 0-18 and the perceived stigma subscale which totals 0-18. These two are summed for the total stigma score. A higher score indicates a worse outcome.
Time frame: 6 weeks
Stigma
The Depression Stigma Scale measures stigmatizing attitudes toward depression treatment. It is a continuous measure and the total score ranges from 0-36. There are two subscales: the personal stigma subscale which totals 0-18 and the perceived stigma subscale which totals 0-18. These two are summed for the total stigma score. A higher score indicates a worse outcome.
Time frame: 12 weeks