Empathy Training for Psychology Students Trainees

Effectiveness of Empathy Training Among Psychology Students Trainees: A Randomized Controlled Trial

This study aims to examine the effectiveness of empathy training for psychology student trainees who plan to become mental health practitioners. The training consists of five sessions of psychoeducation, three-role group exercises, and Q&A. Empathy assessment will be based on self-reported, listener-reported, and observer-reported measurements.

Study Overview

• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Conditions: Empathy
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Empathy Training

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Estimated): 50
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

• Study Contact: Name: Yinyin Zang, PhD; Phone Number: 86 15553201610; Email: yinyin.zang@pku.edu.cn

Study Locations

• China
  • Beijing
    • Peking, Beijing, China, 100871
      • Peking University

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Adult male and female (aged between 18 and 65 years old)
• Major or double major in psychology
• Currently enrolled undergraduate or graduate students
• Taking psychological counselor as one of the major occupational chooses

Exclusion Criteria:

• Hearing, speech, reading, or writing impairments
• A diagnosis of mental disorders
• Simultaneously participating in other emotional skills training
• Suicidal ideation or self-injurious behavior

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: Empathy Training; The Empathy training consists of five sessions. Each session contains psychoeducation, three-role group exercises, and Q&A. The interval between every session is 5-14 days. Sessions are scheduled for 1.5 hours, including 30 minutes of psychoeducation, 45 minutes of three-role group exercises, and 15 minutes of Q&A.	Behavioral: Empathy Training; The intervention contains five themes: 1) An overview of empathy and emotions. 2) Cognitive empathy and clarification technique. 3) Emotional empathy and reflection of feelings technique. 4) Awaring and dealing with the inner feelings while empathizing. 5) Empathy timing and "emotional pendulum" technique.
No Intervention: Wait-List; The participants in the wait-list group will not receive the empathy training or other similar training until all the groups finish their one-month follow-up measurements.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Change from consultation willingness question inquiry	A single item inquiry "How willing are you to come back for consultation next time?" will be asked to the simulation "client" to measure the ability to build the counselor-client relationship. The item scores from 0 to 4. A higher score represents a higher ability to build the counselor-client relationship.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from morphed emotion perception task	An experimental task measures the ability of emotion perception. Participants need to identify the emotion of facial pictures out of six basic emotions (i.e., anger, sadness, fear, disgust, surprise, and happiness). The higher accuracy indicates better emotion perception ability.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the Measure of Empathy Scale	An 8-item empathy self-report scale measures cognitive empathy and emotional empathy on a 5-point Likert scale (score from 1 to 5, and total score vary from 8 to 40). A higher score represents higher empathy ability.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the Emotion Perception Scale	A 13-item emotion perception scale measures the extent of emotions within a month, including anger, happiness, sadness, fear, surprise, disgust, guilt, shame, pressure, depression, inner anger, numbness, and aggrievedness. Each item scores from 0 to 5, with total score varying from 0 to 65. A higher score represents a higher extent of feeling the emotions.	1 month
Change from Baseline of the Peking Alexithymia Scale	A 23-item Peking alexithymia scale measures the ability and willingness to feel, recognize, and share emotions on a 5-point Likert scale (scores from 1 to 5, and total scores vary from 23 to 115). A higher score represents more severe alexithymia.	1 month
Change from counseling duration	A 10-minute counseling simulation will be conducted for each participant. The simulation will last 10 minutes or before 10 minutes if the participant gives up midway. The duration time will be recorded to measure the counseling tolerance of the participants. Longer duration indicates better counseling tolerance.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of 12-Item Version of the Barrett-Lennard Relationship Inventory	A 12-item empathy self-report, senior-psychological-counselor-report, and simulate-client-report scale measures regard (R), empathic understanding (E), congruence (C), and unconditionality of regard (U) of the therapist. The scoring of each item is from -3 to +3 (12 items, total score varies from -36 to 36). A higher score represents better facilitative conditions the therapist can shape.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Change from Baseline of the Patient Health Questionnaire	The 9-item patient health questionnaire (PHQ-9) measures the depression symptoms (scores from 0 to 3, and total score vary from 0 to 27). A higher score represents worse depression symptoms.	2 weeks
Change from Baseline of the Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale	The generalized anxiety disorder-7 scale (GAD-7) measures the generalized anxiety disorder symptoms (scored from 0 to 3, and total score from 0 to 21). A higher score represents worse anxiety symptoms.	2 weeks
Change from Baseline of the Peking Irritability Scale	A 17-item irritability measurement scale, Peking irritability scale, measures impulsive emotions, thoughts, and behaviors on a 5-point Likert scale (score from 1 to 5, and total score vary from 17 to 85). A higher score represents higher irritability.	1 month
Change from Baseline of the the Fatigue Assessment Scale	A 10-item fatigue assessment scale measures the degree of fatigue (score from 1 to 5, and total score vary from 10 to 50). A higher score represents a higher degree of fatigue.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the the Patient Health Questionnaire	A 21-item patient health questionnaire measures the extent of semantic symptoms (score from 0 to 2, and total score vary from 0 to 42). A higher score represents a higher degree of semantic problems.	4 weeks
Change from Baseline of the Cognitive-Emotion Regulation Questionnaire	An 18-item cognitive-emotion regulation questionnaire measures regulation strategy (score from 1 to 5, and total score vary from 18 to 90). A higher score represents higher cognitive-emotion regulation ability.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale	A 36-item difficulties in emotion regulation scale measures emotion regulation difficulties (score from 1 to 5, and total score vary from 36 to 180). A higher score represents higher difficulties in emotion regulation.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the the Satisfaction with Life Scale	A 5-item satisfaction with life scale measures life satisfaction (score from 1 to 7, and total score vary from 5 to 35). A higher score represents more satisfaction with life.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the the Subjective Happiness Scale	A 4-item subjective happiness scale measures happiness (score from 1 to 7, and total score vary from 4 to 28). A higher score represents a happier state.	Through study completion, an average of 3 month
Change from Baseline of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale	A 10-item Connor-Davidson resilience scale measures resilience (score from 0 to 4, and total score vary from 0 to 40). A higher score represents a higher degree of resilience.	1 month

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Peking University
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Yinyin Zang, PhD, Study Principal Investigator Peking University

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Estimated): May 20, 2024
• Primary Completion (Estimated): June 30, 2024
• Study Completion (Estimated): December 30, 2024

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: March 21, 2024
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 31, 2024
• First Posted (Actual): April 8, 2024

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): May 10, 2024
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: May 8, 2024
• Last Verified: May 1, 2024

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: Empathy Training for Students

Drug and device information, study documents

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