Improving College Students' Mental Help-Seeking Intention During the COVID-19 Pandemic (MHI)

February 5, 2024 updated by: Qiwei Luna Wu, Cleveland State University
This study aimed at testing the effectiveness of a longitudinal intervention in increasing college students' intention to seek mental help during the pandemic.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

This study aimed at testing the effectiveness of a longitudinal intervention in increasing college students' intention to seek mental help during the pandemic.

A four-armed randomized controlled experiment was conducted to compare two self-persuasion methods against two control conditions. Assessments took place at baseline (T0), post-first treatment (T1), post-second treatment (six weeks, T2), and ten-week follow-up (T3).

The results showed that the intervention significantly increased students' help-seeking intention, attitude, and efficacy at different time points. It also reduced mental help-seeking-related stigma after the first task.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

926

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • Texas
      • College Station, Texas, United States, 77843
        • Texas A&M University

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • 18 years old or older
  • Full-time undergraduate students
  • Had more than a moderate amount of mental distress

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Under 18 years old
  • Not full-time undergraduate students
  • Had less than a moderate amount of mental distress

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Health Services Research
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Single

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: YouTube Intervention
Participants assigned to this task were asked to search YouTube for a 5-10 minutes' video promoting mental help-seeking among college students. Then, they were expected to provide the link to the video and describe the content of the video. Next, participants were guided to form rebuttals disapproving three statements that rationalize students' low intention to seek mental help.
Behavioral: Mental help-seeking self-persuasion
Employing a longitudinal design, this study used a self-persuasion framework in a 4-arm intervention to increase college students' help-seeking intentions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Active Comparator: Facebook Intervention
This task was to draft a Facebook message for the participants' fellow students. In their message, participants were expected to list three reasons for seeking mental help. The length of the message was not pre-determined.
Behavioral: Mental help-seeking self-persuasion
Employing a longitudinal design, this study used a self-persuasion framework in a 4-arm intervention to increase college students' help-seeking intentions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Placebo Comparator: YouTube Control Group
Participants in this group were assigned a YouTube task advocating social distancing during a pandemic. The question prompts were modified from the tasks for the experimental groups.
Behavioral: Mental help-seeking self-persuasion
Employing a longitudinal design, this study used a self-persuasion framework in a 4-arm intervention to increase college students' help-seeking intentions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Placebo Comparator: Facebook Control Group
Participants in this group were assigned a Facebook task advocating social distancing during a pandemic. The question prompts were modified from the tasks for the experimental groups.
Behavioral: Mental help-seeking self-persuasion
Employing a longitudinal design, this study used a self-persuasion framework in a 4-arm intervention to increase college students' help-seeking intentions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Help-Seeking Intention
Time Frame: 10 weeks
Help-Seeking Intention was measured by one item created based on recommendations by Ajzen (2002). Measured on a 5-point scale (1 = extremely unlikely, 5 = extremely likely), this item asked, "If you have a personal-emotional problem, how likely is it that you would seek help from a mental health professional (a psychologist, psychologist, or psychotherapist)?" Higher scores on this item suggest higher intentions to seek professional mental help.
10 weeks
Help-Seeking Behavior
Time Frame: 10 weeks
Help-Seeking Behavior was measured by a validated item modified from previous research based on the transtheoretical model (Sarkin et al., 2001). The item asked about if a participant has sought mental help from a health care professional. Answers to this item included "1 = not intending to seek help in the next six months," "2 = intending to seek help in the next six months," "3 = planning to seek help in the next 30 days," "4 = have already sought help but for less than six months," and "5 = have been under treatment for more than six months."
10 weeks

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Mental help-seeking attitudes
Time Frame: 10 weeks
participants rated 1 ("strongly disagree") to 5 ("strongly agree") on ten items of the Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help Scale-Short Form (ATSPPHS-SF) (Fischer & Farina, 1995).
10 weeks
Self-stigma of seeking mental help
Time Frame: 10/2020 - 1/10 weeks
Participants rated 1 ("strongly disagree") to 5 ("strongly agree") on ten items adopted from the Self-Stigma of Seeking Help (SSOSH) scale (Vogel et al., 2006).
10/2020 - 1/10 weeks
Mental help-seeking efficacy
Time Frame: 10 weeks
Mental Help-Seeking Efficacy was measured by five items modified from previous research (Mo & Mak, 2009) and recommendations (Ajzen, 2002). Participants rated 1 ("strongly disagree") to 5 ("strongly agree") on the answers.
10 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Cleveland State University

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Qiwei Wu, Cleveland State University

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

October 1, 2020

Primary Completion (Actual)

January 30, 2021

Study Completion (Actual)

January 31, 2021

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

July 6, 2022

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

July 7, 2022

First Posted (Actual)

July 11, 2022

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimated)

February 6, 2024

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

February 5, 2024

Last Verified

February 1, 2024

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • ClevelandSU

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

IPD Plan Description

IPD will not be shared as required by the IRB protocol.

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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