Bereaved Young Adults Study

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)

Status: Completed

Conditions: Bereavement

Treatments: Behavioral: Fact-Writing; Behavioral: Expressive Disclosure; Behavioral: Expressive Helping

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT05352243

21-001728

Details and patient eligibility

About

Bereaved adolescents and emerging adults are at risk for developing psychological disorders and complicated grief. Clinical grief interventions and conventional wisdom reflect an implicit assumption that sharing and expressing one's feelings surrounding a loss (i.e., emotional disclosure) facilitates psychological adjustment. However, studies of emotional disclosure have yielded null results in bereaved samples. Individuals who have encountered stressful life events, including interpersonal loss, often report a desire to "give back" to others in similar situations. Empirical evidence suggests that providing support to others can be equally, if not more, beneficial than receiving support. The opportunity to support others experiencing stressful circumstances may address common feelings of powerlessness and engender a sense of meaning, enhancing positive affect and reducing distress. Interventions that leverage prosocial behaviors are associated with positive effects, including increases in wellbeing in non-bereaved populations. To date, no research has examined the utility of prosocial interventions for bereaved individuals.

The present study tests a novel expressive helping intervention that combines elements of expressive disclosure and prosocial writing. Expressive helping will be compared to traditional expressive disclosure and a neutral writing control condition in a sample of bereaved young adults. Participants (N=156) will be randomized to one of three conditions-expressive disclosure, expressive helping, or a neutral writing control-and complete three weekly 20-minute writing sessions. Measures of psychological distress, well-being, and hypothesized mediators will be administered before, immediately following (within 48 hours of the final writing session), one month, and two months after the writing sessions. It is hypothesized that the participants in the expressive helping condition will evidence greater increases in well-being and decreases in grief-related distress at the one and two-month follow-ups, as compared to the other two groups.

Enrollment: 178 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 26 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

1. Experienced the death of a loved one within the last 5 years, but more than 6 months ago.
2. Endorse having close relationship with loved one at time of their death (i.e., 5 or above on 1-10 likert scale with 1 being not at all close, and 10 being extremely close).
3. Endorse moderate to severe distress about the loss (i.e., 5 or above on 1-10 likert scale with 1 being not at all distressed, and 10 being extremely distressed).
4. Feel comfortable writing in English (due to the linguistic nature of the writing sessions).
5. Have access to the Internet and a computer to complete the assessments and writing sessions.

Exclusion criteria

1. Express active psychosis or suicidal ideation, or any other circumstances that, in the opinion of the investigators, compromise participant safety.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Supportive Care

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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178 participants in 3 patient groups

Expressive Disclosure

Active Comparator group

Description:

Participants will be instructed to write about their deepest thoughts and feelings surrounding their bereavement experience.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Expressive Disclosure

Expressive Helping

Experimental group

Description:

Participants will be instructed to write about their deepest thoughts and feeling surrounding their bereavement experience in their first two essays and to provide advice and support for someone who recently experienced a loss in their final essay.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Expressive Helping

Fact-Writing

Sham Comparator group

Description:

Participants will be instructed to write objectively about different time frames (e.g., routine for getting up in the morning, routine for going to sleep at night).

Treatment:

Behavioral: Fact-Writing