Pet Partners for Promotion of Academic Life Skills (Pet PALS)

Washington State University

Status: Unknown

Conditions: Anxiety Disorders and Symptoms; Alpha-amylase; Animal Stress; Cortisol; Momentary Emotion; Motivation and Learning; Depression Disorders and Symptoms; Stress Prevention; Study Strategies; Dyadic Interaction; Executive Functioning; Animal Behavior; Perceived Stress

Treatments: Behavioral: Animal Assisted Activities; Behavioral: Academic Stress Management tools

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT03530943

126634-001

Details and patient eligibility

About

The current study utilized a randomized controlled trial, conducted in a real-life setting, to determine whether, how, under which conditions, and for whom, infusing various levels of human-animal interaction (HAI) in a 4-week, university-based stress prevention program provides an effective approach to prevent negative ramifications of university students stress, promote student executive functioning and learning, while safeguarding animal welfare. This study will examine effects of sole exposure to evidence-based stress prevention content, hands-on HAI with registered PET Partner teams, or combinations thereof on students' moment-to-moment well-being and longer-term functioning in socioemotional, cognitive and physiological domains.This study will also develop a comprehensive coding system and measure the dynamic nature of behavior of participants, handlers and animals during university- based animal assisted activities, as well as the HAI environment. The data and analyses will then be utilized to inform the development of a quantitative measure to capture of the quality of human animal interaction in various settings to experimentally determine causal pathways underlying program effects on humans and animals.

Enrollment: 300 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 30 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Current enrollment at the campus

Exclusion criteria

• Children under 18 years old
• Prior history of animal abuse
• Participation in an an academic stress management workshop within 6 months of study participation

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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300 participants in 3 patient groups

Academic Stress Management

Active Comparator group

Description:

Students assigned to the Academic Stress Management (ASM) condition will attend a series of once weekly, one hour long workshops over four consecutive weeks during which time they will receive 100% exposure to various evidence-based academic stress management tools.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Academic Stress Management tools

Human Animal Interaction Enhanced

Experimental group

Description:

Students assigned to the Human Animal Interaction - Enhanced (HAI-E) condition will attend a series of once weekly, one hour long workshops over four consecutive weeks. This group receives 50% exposure to structured and unstructured animal assisted activities and 50% exposure to various evidence-based academic stress management tools.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Animal Assisted Activities

Behavioral: Academic Stress Management tools

Human Animal Interaction only

Experimental group

Description:

Students assigned to the Human Animal Interaction - only (HAI-O) condition will attend a series of once weekly, one hour long workshops over four consecutive weeks. This group will be receive 100% exposure to structured and semi-structured animal assisted activities.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Animal Assisted Activities