Legal-Education Plus Trauma-informed Therapy to Improve Community Acceptance and Reintegration of Repentant Terrorists in Nigeria (LETiT)

Legal-Education Plus Trauma-informed Therapy to Improve Community Acceptance and Reintegration of Repentant Terrorists in Nigeria: A Pilot Randomised Controlled Trial

Terrorism is an issue of global concern, and reintegrating repentant terrorists, including their families, has often proved challenging considering the damages done by the terrorist group. Despite Boko Haram atrocities in Nigeria, the focus seems directed toward the repentant terrorists with limited attention to the communities, the trauma they suffered, and their involvement in the design of reintegration programmes. There is also limited community awareness of legal support channels to foster positive reintegration (Ike et al., 2021). The implication is that it risks undermining the social context that informs successful reintegration, improves acceptance, and reduces reoffending. However, there appears to be limited research on this important policy problem in Nigeria. Our study proposes to fill this gap by contributing to the research initiative through a novel cross-disciplinary intervention drawing on law and psychology entitled Legal Education plus Trauma-informed Therapy (LETiT) to improve community acceptance and reintegration of repentant terrorists in Nigeria.

Study Overview

• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Conditions: Trauma, Psychological; Legal Education
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Legal Education plus Trauma-informed Therapy (LETiT); Behavioral: Intervention As Usual (IAU)

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Anticipated): 150
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

• Study Contact: Name: Dung Jidong, PhD; Phone Number: +44 115 84 86478; Email: dung.jidong@ntu.ac.uk
• Study Contact Backup: Name: Tarela Ike, PhD; Phone Number: +44 1642 34 2316; Email: t.ike@tees.ac.uk

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years to 85 years (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• ages 18 - 85 years
• able to give consent
• able to understand and speak English
• score a minimum of 5 on Trauma Screening Questionnaire
• residents of designated communities of intervention (Adamawa, Maiduguri, and Plateau states)
• available for the study and follow up at 3- and 6-months post-intervention

Exclusion Criteria:

• less than 18 or above 85 years
• unable to give consent
• clinically diagnosed with severe PTSD/suicidal ideations or undergoing treatment
• temporary or non-residents who are unlikely to be available for follow up

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Treatment
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: Single

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: LETiT; The LETiT intervention will cover (a) Legal education with numerous aspects relating to human rights, access to legal support and tackling traumatic experiences. (b) The Trauma-informed Therapy component will involve addressing trauma, dispelling negative thoughts and building more positive thinking. It is worth adding that the LETiT intervention has undergone standardisation of procedure by adopting a coherent manual (e.g., the Legal Education plus Trauma-informed Therapy manual) specifically designed for the proposed intervention. For example, the legal education contents are collated from extant laws, including the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.	Behavioral: Legal Education plus Trauma-informed Therapy (LETiT); Group-1: Experimental (n=75 participants) will receive the LETiT which consists of a total of 12-group integrated sessions lasting approximately 60-90 minutes per session every week with 20-25 persons per sub-group.
Active Comparator: Intervention As Usual (IAU); The Intervention As Usual (IAU) component of the proposed project is designed through a systematic collation of numerous government and non-governmental organisations' support information (e.g., news information and basic re-orientation of community members affected by terrorism). Thus, the IAU group will receive the government intervention involving media messages from the National Orientation Agency devoid of legal education or trauma-informed therapy. The training materials are organised to address key aspects of care such as (a) acknowledgement of the severity of lived experiences (b) reflection of current help received from the government and humanitarian services (c) essential aspects of self-care and caring for the vulnerable family and community members (d) inspiration for the future etc.	Behavioral: Intervention As Usual (IAU); Group-2: Controlled (n=75 participants) will receive the IAU which consists of a total of 12-group integrated sessions lasting approximately 60-90 minutes per session every week with 20-25 persons per sub-group.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Trauma Screening Questionnaire	Change in traumatic experience is being assessed	Change is being assessed at baseline, at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention
Adaptive Stress Index	Change in stress is being assessed	Change is being assessed at baseline, at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention
Patient Health Questionnaire	Change in depression is being assessed	Change is being assessed at baseline, at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention
Generalised Anxiety Disorder Scale	Change in anxiety is being assessed	Change is being assessed at baseline, at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention
Legal-Education Awareness Scale	Change in awareness of human right is being assessed	Change is being assessed at baseline, at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention
Attitude Towards Repentant Terrorists and their Reintegration Scale	Change in of attitude towards repentant terrorists is being assessed	Change is being assessed at baseline, at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention
brief Verona Service Satisfaction Scale	Change in service satisfaction is being assessed	Change is being assessed at 12 weeks end of intervention, at 3-months, and at 6-months post-intervention

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Nottingham Trent University
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Dung Jidong, PhD, Nottingham Trent University, UK

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Anticipated): June 20, 2022
• Primary Completion (Anticipated): June 19, 2023
• Study Completion (Anticipated): September 30, 2023

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: May 25, 2022
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: May 25, 2022
• First Posted (Actual): May 31, 2022

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): May 31, 2022
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: May 25, 2022
• Last Verified: May 1, 2022

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Mental Disorders; Trauma and Stressor Related Disorders; Stress Disorders, Traumatic; Wounds and Injuries; Psychological Trauma
• Other Study ID Numbers: 0000-0001-5034-0335d

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: YES

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No