Increasing Kindergarten Social-Emotional Skills for Positive Long-Term Mental Health

Increasing Kindergarten Social-Emotional Skills for Positive Long-Term Mental Health: A Pilot Test of the Strengthening Social-Emotional Skills for Relating and Thriving at School (SSTRS) Program

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if the Social-emotional Skills for Thriving and Relating at School (SSTRS) Program can help children entering kindergarten and their families. The main questions it aims to answer are: 1) Do children who participate in SSTRS have better social-emotional skills and mental health? and 2) Do parents who participate in SSTRS have more positive parenting skills and involvement in their children's learning?

Researchers will compare the SSTRS Program to the regular kindergarten curriculum without SSTRS to see if being in SSTRS helps children to have better mental health and parents to have better parenting skills.

Kindergarteners will have daily SSTRS lessons in their kindergarten classes for 8 weeks.

Their parents will watch videos and attend group meetings with other parents and answer questions about their own and their children's behaviors and mental health

Study Overview

• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Conditions: Social Emotional Competence; Externalizing Behavior; Parenting Behavior; Internalizing Behavior
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Social-emotional Skills for Thriving and Relating at School Program

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

Contacts and Locations

• Study Contact: Name: Katherine Pears, Ph.D.; Phone Number: 5414852711; Email: katherinep@oslc.org
• Study Contact Backup: Name: Deena Scheidt; Phone Number: 5414852711; Email: deenas@oslc.org

Study Locations

• United States
  • Oregon
    • Eugene, Oregon, United States, 97401
      • Oregon Social Learning Center
      • Contact: Katherine Pears, Ph.D.; Phone Number: 5414852711; Email: katherinep@oslc.org
      • Contact: Deena Scheidt; Phone Number: 5414852711; Email: deenas@oslc.org
      • Contact: Katherine Pears, Ph.D.

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

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

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• child entering kindergarten in school that is participiating in the study

Exclusion Criteria:

• being in a classroom in which the teacher or EA was previously trained in another closely-related treatment protocol

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

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

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: SSTRS group; These participants will participate in the SSTRS intervention.	Behavioral: Social-emotional Skills for Thriving and Relating at School Program; The SSTRS Program is a developmentally-tailored, school-based preventive intervention focusing on children and their parents at the critical transition to kindergarten to prevent deficits in children's social-emotional skills-which are known transdiagnostic risk factors for a range of mental health problems. Children receive SSTRS programming during their regular school day for eight weeks at the beginning of the school year. Parents receive SSTRS programming via informational videos and virtual parenting groups during the same time period.
No Intervention: Services as Usual; These participants will receive kindergarten programming as usual.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Strengths & Difficulties Questionnaire	Parent and teacher report on the 25-item measure yields five subscales: Emotional Symptoms Scale (scores range 0-10, high scores indicate more problems), Conduct Problems Scale (scores range 0-10, high scores indicate more problems), Hyperactivity Scale (scores range 0-10, high scores indicate more problems) , Peer Problems Scale (scores range 0-10, high scores indicate more problems), and Prosocial Scale (scores range 0-10, high scores indicate better social skills). A Total Difficulties Score can also be derived by summing all of the scales except the Prosocial Scale resulting in a score raniging from 0 to 40 with higher scores denoting greater difficulties.	Parents will complete the measure at baseline, 2 months post-baseline at the end of the intervention and 9 months post-baseline. Teachers will complete the measure at 9 months post-baseline.
Office discipline referrals	These are records of referrals for serious behaviors within the school setting. They are administartive records.	These will be collected at 9 months post-baseline.

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Oregon Social Learning Center
• Collaborators: National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Katherine Pears, Ph.D., Oregon Social Learning Center

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Estimated): February 1, 2026
• Primary Completion (Estimated): August 1, 2028
• Study Completion (Estimated): November 1, 2028

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: March 21, 2025
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 26, 2025
• First Posted (Actual): April 3, 2025

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): April 3, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 26, 2025
• Last Verified: March 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: R34MH138714 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: YES
• IPD Plan Description: Deidentified participant data will be shared to the NIMH Data Archive (NDA).
• IPD Sharing Time Frame: Data will be available no later than 2027. There is no end date.
• IPD Sharing Access Criteria: Access will be granted according to the procedures for accessing data from the NDA.
• IPD Sharing Supporting Information Type: STUDY_PROTOCOL; SAP; ICF

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No
• product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.: No