Effects of the Integrated-based Laughing Qigong Program on Resilience in Community-dwelling Older Adults

March 9, 2023 updated by: Chia Jung Hsieh, National Taipei University of Nursing and Health Sciences

Effects of the Integrated-based Laughing Qigong Program on Resilience in Community-dwelling Older Adults: An Explanatory Sequential Mixed Method

Laughter programs are safe, affordable, and age-appropriate activities. Few studies have utilized mixed study designs to look at the impact on resilience in and experiences of participants in such activities.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

A high level of resilience can also help to mitigate the negative effects of stress and promote personal adaptation. According to a prior study, the resilience scale can be used to screen and identify maladaptive people before they cause problems, allowing for the development of preventive interventions (Wells, 2012). Some researchers have used cross talk and laughter therapy in patients with depression and reported that the negative symptoms of their mental health were alleviated (Yoshikawa et al., 2019), and laughter therapy for disabled adolescents improved their resilience (Shinde, & Kotekar, 2022). Another researcher discovered through interviews that older adults who laugh can maintain their personal health and age successfully (Lewis, 2021), but there is currently little research on how laughter affects the resilience of older adults.

Previous research applied laughter as a mental health-promoting activity, called the Laughter Qigong program, to promote mental health and generate positive effects on both physical and mental well-being (Hsieh et al., 2015). According to Kuru Alc, Zorba Bahceli, and Emirolu (2018), laughter intervention is risk-free, inexpensive, and beneficial for promoting the mental health of older adults. It has been used successfully with these people in long-term care facilities (Hsieh et al, 2015). The IB-LQP was administered twice weekly for four weeks to older adults living in institutions. It was discovered to have a positive impact on stress cortisol levels (Hsieh et al., 2015), as well as the ability to lessen death fear and enhance loneliness (Kuru Alc, Zorba Bahceli, & Emirolu, 2018). The research on laughter-based interventions for community senior citizens is still in its early stages, and more research is needed to fully understand how senior citizens participate in locally tailored activities.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

39

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

  • Taiwan
      • Taipei City, Taiwan, 112303
        • National Taipei University of Nursing and Health Sciences

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

65 years and older (Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

(1) age of ≧ 65 years, (2) ability to travel to the location of the activities on their own (independent or partially dependent people with daily activities), and (3) willingness to participate in this activity intervention

Exclusion Criteria:

(1) Severe hearing or sensory deficits that cause communication barriers, (2) diagnosis of depression, and (3) hospitalization plans in the next three months.

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: Triple

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Active Comparator: Experimental group
Experiment group A accepted the Integrated-based Laughing Qigong Program (IB-LQP) During the intervention, the participants formed a standing circle and could make eye contact. The time was divided into 10 minutes of warm-up (deep breathing, stretching of muscles, expressing various emotions on the face, stretching of limbs) and 30-40 minutes of main exercise (Breathing and Laughing Qigong practice). The main exercise included using the natural breath of laughter to activate the body, turning a fake smile into a real smile and laughter, using different body movements at the same time, producing a variety of types of laughter, and conducting self-emotional awareness and emotional transformation drills to reduce the backlog.
Behavioral: Integrated-based Laughing Qigong Program
The protocol of the Integrated-based Laughing Qigong Program (IB-LQP) combined laughter intervention and mental health promotion courses. It was a two-hour community activity held twice a week for six weeks. The content was 50-60 minutes of a laughter practice program and 50 minutes of mental health lectures, separated by a 10-minute break.
No Intervention: control group
The control group received no intervention and was asked to maintain their current lifestyle for 6 weeks following the baseline test.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Chinese Version of the Resilience Scale
Time Frame: Pre-intervention(T0)
The content of the Chinese version of the Resilience Scale includes five levels: a meaningful life, a peaceful mind, self-confidence, an indomitable spirit, and acceptance of the loneliness of existence. The highest score is 7 points (extremely satisfied), and the lowest score is 1 point (extremely dissatisfied). A higher score indicates greater resilience (Ahern, Kiehl, Sole, and Byers, 2006). Psychometric assessment of this scale has supported its internal consistency reliability and concurrent validity as good, and many studies have confirmed that the scale is applicable to samples of all ages and races (Ahern, Kiehl, Sole, Byers, 2006). The Cronbach's α for internal consistency in this study was .91.
Pre-intervention(T0)
The Face Scale
Time Frame: Pre-intervention(T0)
The face scale is a nonverbal emotion scale used to evaluate students' participation in courses (Lorish and Maisiak, 1986). It has seven faces, with number one representing the happiest and number seven representing the saddest. Before and after taking the " IB-LQP " course, the participants chose the facial scale that best represented their mood. This scale is appropriate for assessing emotions after older adults participate in activities and has high reliability (Hsieh et al., 2015).
Pre-intervention(T0)
Chinese Version of the Resilience Scale
Time Frame: 6-week after intervention (T1)
The content of the Chinese version of the Resilience Scale includes five levels: a meaningful life, a peaceful mind, self-confidence, an indomitable spirit, and acceptance of the loneliness of existence. The highest score is 7 points (extremely satisfied), and the lowest score is 1 point (extremely dissatisfied). A higher score indicates greater resilience (Ahern, Kiehl, Sole, and Byers, 2006). Psychometric assessment of this scale has supported its internal consistency reliability and concurrent validity as good, and many studies have confirmed that the scale is applicable to samples of all ages and races (Ahern, Kiehl, Sole, Byers, 2006). The Cronbach's α for internal consistency in this study was .91
6-week after intervention (T1)
The Face Scale
Time Frame: 6-week after intervention (T1)
The face scale is a nonverbal emotion scale used to evaluate students' participation in courses (Lorish and Maisiak, 1986). It has seven faces, with number one representing the happiest and number seven representing the saddest. Before and after taking the " IB-LQP " course, the participants chose the facial scale that best represented their mood. This scale is appropriate for assessing emotions after older adults participate in activities and has high reliability (Hsieh et al., 2015).
6-week after intervention (T1)

Collaborators and Investigators

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

Sponsor

National Taipei University of Nursing and Health Sciences

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Chia Jung Hsieh, National Taipei University of Nursing and Health Sciences

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

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)

July 2, 2019

Primary Completion (Actual)

December 30, 2020

Study Completion (Actual)

July 31, 2021

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

March 9, 2023

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

March 9, 2023

First Posted (Actual)

March 22, 2023

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

March 22, 2023

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

March 9, 2023

Last Verified

March 1, 2023

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Other Study ID Numbers

  • FJU-IRB C106177

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

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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