Behavioral Economics Intervention to Increase Treatment Seeking in the National Guard (BEAST)

University of Southern Mississippi

Status: Invitation-only

Conditions: Treatment Refusal

Treatments: Behavioral: BEAST; Behavioral: Descriptive Feedback

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04098588

W81XWH-16-2-0003

Details and patient eligibility

About

The study is a randomized controlled trial of a single-session behavioral economics (research combining the areas of economics, social psychology, and cognitive psychology) intervention (i.e., BEAST) is a"warrior-culture" consistent (i.e., focusing on positive soldier traits, solving practical problems), highly scalable, and extremely brief (10-minute) intervention to encourage treatment seeking among MS National Guard problems for various life stressors. Participants will be 112 National Guard members. It is hypothesized that BEAST will lead to more self-reported motivation to seek treatment and more actual treatment seeking behavior.

Enrollment: 112 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 65 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• National Guard active
• > 17 ACSS-FAD

Exclusion criteria

• those determined by military or study personnel to be actively psychotic, manic, or who are imminently suicidal and in need of emergency services.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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112 participants in 2 patient groups

BEAST

Experimental group

Description:

There are 3 parts to BEAST. Part 1 involves the Behavioral Nudge technique using previously collected injunctive and descriptive norms from a National Guard sample. Soldiers will be given a customized feedback form that shows norms relevant to the target behavior they selected. The soldier will be given a chance to ask any follow-up questions. Part 2 of the intervention focuses on the principle of targeting others, considering how a change would impact those closest to them. Part 3 will utilize the Reciprocal Concessions procedure combined with the Reducing Barriers technique.

Treatment:

Behavioral: BEAST

Descriptive Feedback

Active Comparator group

Description:

This condition will involve a presentation of descriptive data based on the soldiers' tests scores and an opportunity to ask any follow-up questions. This process is a component of some behavioral change interventions (e.g., motivational interviewing); therefore this should be a more useful control condition (mirroring parts 1 and 2 of the active condition) versus a more passive or waitlist control condition. Participants in the control condition will also be given standard referral information to the USM Psychology Clinic (mirroring part 3 of the active condition).

Treatment:

Behavioral: Descriptive Feedback