Journal article
Preventing depression in final year secondary students: School-based randomized controlled trial
Y Perry, A Werner-Seidler, A Calear, A Mackinnon, C King, MC Psych, J Scott, S Merry, T Fleming, K Stasiak, H Christensen, PJ Batterham
Journal of Medical Internet Research | JMIR PUBLICATIONS, INC | Published : 2017
DOI: 10.2196/jmir.8241
Open access
Abstract
Background: Depression often emerges for the first time during adolescence. There is accumulating evidence that universal depression prevention programs may have the capacity to reduce the impact of depression when delivered in the school environment. Objective: This trial investigated the effectiveness of SPARX-R, a gamified online cognitive behavior therapy intervention for the prevention of depression relative to an attention-matched control intervention delivered to students prior to facing a significant stressor-final secondary school exams. It was hypothesized that delivering a prevention intervention in advance of a stressor would reduce depressive symptoms relative to the control gro..
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Awarded by National Science Foundation
Funding Acknowledgements
This project was supported by an Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) project grant 1061072 to HC. HC is supported by an NHMRC John Cade fellowship (1056964). ALC and PJB are supported by NHMRC fellowships 1013199 and 1083311. The funders had no role in the design, execution, analyses, or data interpretation for this study or in the decision to submit the results for publication. We would like to thank Professor Julio Lucinio and Dr Tara Donker for assistance in developing the research concept and Noel Thomsen for assistance and guidance in school recruitment. We would also like to thank the schools that participated in our trial and, in particular, the teachers and school counselors who facilitated its implementation. We would also like to acknowledge the work of the systems administrators at the Black Dog Institute, who designed and implemented the online platform that delivered both the interventions and assessments to trial participants.