Research School of Psychology, 39 Science Road, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia; College of Education, Psychology and Social Work, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide, SA 5001, Australia.
School of Psychology, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide, SA 5001, Australia.
J Affect Disord. 2022 Jan 15;297:437-446. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2021.10.079. Epub 2021 Oct 29.
Childhood anxiety and depression lead to great distress and impairment. Preventing them simultaneously in early life is critically important. We evaluated the long-term efficacy of an emotion regulation-based (ER) and a behavioural activation-based (BA) program. Both aimed to build resilience to prevent worry, a transdiagnostic feature across anxiety and depression.
Participants were 316 students (52.2% female; 8-13 years) from six South Australian primary schools. Schools were randomised to the ER, BA or a control condition. Measures of resilience, worry, anxiety, and depression were taken at pre- and post- program, and at 6- and 12-month follow-up. In addition, levels of emotion regulation, behavioural activation and resilience were measured as potential mediators of changes in anxiety and depression.
No significant condition × time interactions were observed. However, the percentage of children who met the clinical cut-offs for generalised anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder decreased significantly in the BA condition at 12-month follow-up, as well as the percentage of children who met the clinical cut-off for obsessive compulsive disorder in the ER condition. Furthermore, emotion regulation mediated the relationship between condition and worry at post-program in the ER condition.
The sample size is relatively small. Reliance on child self-report may have resulted in inaccurate responses.
The ER and BA transdiagnostic prevention programs for childhood anxiety and depression showed promising results for certain anxiety disorders not otherwise observed in universal school-based studies. Future research should consider evaluating the programs with a larger sample using alternative outcome measures.
儿童期的焦虑和抑郁会导致极大的痛苦和障碍。因此，在早期同时预防这两种疾病至关重要。我们评估了基于情绪调节（ER）和基于行为激活（BA）的干预项目的长期疗效。这两种干预都旨在建立韧性，以预防担忧，这是焦虑和抑郁共病的一种跨诊断特征。
参与者为来自南澳大利亚六所小学的 316 名学生（52.2%为女性；8-13 岁）。学校被随机分配到 ER、BA 或对照组。在项目前、后以及 6 个月和 12 个月随访时，评估了韧性、担忧、焦虑和抑郁的测量值。此外，还测量了情绪调节、行为激活和韧性的水平，以作为焦虑和抑郁变化的潜在中介。
未观察到条件×时间的交互作用。然而，在 12 个月的随访中，BA 组中符合广泛性焦虑障碍和重度抑郁障碍临床标准的儿童比例以及 ER 组中符合强迫症临床标准的儿童比例显著下降。此外，在 ER 组中，情绪调节在项目后与担忧之间的关系中起中介作用。
样本量相对较小。依赖儿童自我报告可能导致不准确的反应。
针对儿童焦虑和抑郁的 ER 和 BA 跨诊断预防计划显示出了某些特定焦虑障碍的有希望的结果，而这些结果在普遍性的学校研究中并未观察到。未来的研究应考虑使用更大的样本和替代的结果测量方法来评估这些项目。
