The Effects of the Somatic Intervention 'Dance-Walk' on Body Awareness, Vitality, and Mental Health in Help-Seeking Adults: a RCT Study (DANCEWALK)

December 9, 2025 updated by: Inga Truskauskaitė, Vilnius University

The Effectiveness of The Somatic Intervention 'Dance-Walk' on Body Awareness, Vitality, and Mental Health

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if a movement program called "Dance-Walk" can improve body awareness, energy levels, and mental health in adults seeking mental health support. The main questions it aims to answer are:

Does Dance-Walk help people feel more connected to their bodies? Does Dance-Walk increase people's energy and vitality? Does Dance-Walk improve mental health by reducing depression, anxiety, and stress?

Researchers will compare people who do Dance-Walk right away to people who wait to do the program later to see if Dance-Walk works to improve mental health.

All participants will fill out online surveys about their mood, energy levels, and body awareness at the start of the study. Then, every participant will be randomly placed into one of two groups - one group will start Dance-Walk right away, the other will wait. Participants who will be assigned to the first group will attend 4 weekly Dance-Walk sessions that combine movement, dance, and walking. All participants will fill out the same surveys again after the 4-week program. Participants who will be assigned to the second group will get to do the Dance-Walk program after the first group finishes.

Each Dance-Walk session will focus on helping people tune into their body feelings and use movement to manage emotions and stress. The program is designed to help people feel more energetic and improve their overall mental well-being.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

117

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

  • Lithuania
      • Vilnius, Lithuania
        • Vilnius 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

  • Adult
  • Older Adult

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Age 18 years or older
  • Seeking to improve emotional well-being or mental health
  • Able to participate in light physical activity (walking and gentle movement)
  • Able to read and understand Lithuanian language
  • Willing to attend 4 weekly group sessions
  • Able to complete online questionnaires
  • Willing to be randomly assigned to either immediate intervention or waitlist group
  • Able to provide informed consent

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Under 18 years of age
  • Current severe mental health crisis requiring immediate professional intervention
  • Physical limitations that prevent participation in walking or gentle movement activities
  • Unable to commit to attending 4 weekly sessions
  • Currently participating in another research study involving mental health interventions
  • Unable to access internet for completing online questionnaires

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: Treatment
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Intervention group
Participated in the "Dance-Walk" intervention after baseline measurment
Behavioral: Dance-walk
Dance-Walk is a 4-week somatic intervention combining movement, dance, and walking elements designed to enhance body awareness and emotional regulation. The program consists of 4 weekly group sessions, each lasting approximately 90-120 minutes. Sessions focus on helping participants connect with their body sensations through guided movement exercises that integrate dance movements with mindful walking practices. The intervention targets autonomic nervous system regulation and aims to improve interoceptive awareness, emotional expression, and stress management through embodied practices. Sessions are facilitated by trained practitioners and emphasize non-verbal emotional expression and somatic experiencing to promote mental health and vitality.
No Intervention: Waiting-list control
Participates in the "Dance-Walk" intervention after the last study measure

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness Scale-2 (MAIA-2) (Mehling et al., 2018)
Time Frame: Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)
Assesses multiple dimensions of interoceptive awareness, including noticing (score range: 0-20), not-distracting (score range: 0-30), not-worrying (score range: 0-25), attention regulation (score range: 0-35), emotional awareness (score range: 0-25), self-regulation (score range: 0-20), body listening (score range: 0-15), and trusting (score range: 0-15). Higher scores indicate greater interoceptive awareness (better outcome).
Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)
Subjective Vitality Scale (SVS) (Ryan & Frederick, 1997)
Time Frame: Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)
Measures feelings of energy and aliveness (score range: 0-47). Higher scores indicate greater subjective vitality and energy levels (better outcome).
Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21) (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995)
Time Frame: Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)
Assesses symptoms of depression (score range: 0-21), anxiety (score range: 0-21), and stress (score range: 0-21). Higher scores indicate more mental health problems (worse outcome).
Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)
Positive Mental Health Scale (PMH-Scale) (Lukat et al., 2016)
Time Frame: Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)
Measures positive aspects of mental health, including emotional well-being, psychological well-being, and social well-being (score range: 0-27). Higher scores indicate better positive mental health (better outcome).
Baseline to immediately post-intervention (approximately 4 weeks)

Collaborators and Investigators

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

Sponsor

Vilnius University

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Inga Truskauskaite, PhD, Vilnius University

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)

March 12, 2025

Primary Completion (Actual)

June 30, 2025

Study Completion (Actual)

June 30, 2025

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

June 9, 2025

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

June 9, 2025

First Posted (Actual)

June 17, 2025

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

December 10, 2025

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

December 9, 2025

Last Verified

December 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • (1.13 E) 250000-KT-33

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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