An Online Large-group One-session Treatment for Public Speaking Anxiety

NCT04790864 | Completed

• 1 other identifier: 684
• Study Type: interventional
• Target: 60
• Locations: 1 country
• Sites: 1

Brief Summary

Different conceptualizations of public speaking anxiety exist to which it can be either considered as a qualitatively distinct subtype of social phobia or a quantitatively less severe form of a more impairing generalized social phobia. However, the prevalence of public speaking fears can be regarded as high and there is considerable evidence for interference with work or education. In addition, public speaking anxiety can cause marked distress suggesting that the impairment, at least in some individuals, is high enough to warrant professional treatment. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) has turned out as an effective treatment for social phobia in general but also for public speaking anxiety. Nevertheless, some aspects hinder the successful delivery of CBT to anxious individuals. On the one hand, individuals are sometimes uncertain if the severity of their symptoms and impairment justifies professional treatment. On the other hand, groups are required for conducting exposure interventions. This study tries to circumvent these limitations by lowering the access to treatment and by providing treatment in a group of anxious individuals. Large-group one-session treatments have been shown to be feasible in the treatment of specific phobias and fears and investigations revealed first evidence regarding their efficacy. The COVID-19 pandemic makes it impossible to conduct face-to-face group sessions, so an online setting making use of a videoconference tool has been chosen. In this study, the investigators plan to conduct an online large-group one-session treatment to reduce public speaking anxiety comprising different cognitive and behavioral techniques. First, anxiety and its function in general as well as factors causing, defining and maintaining public speaking anxiety are addressed in a psychoeducation phase. Second, different speaking tasks are conducted to expose the individuals to their feared situation on the one hand and to address common cognitive processes characterizing public speaking anxiety, e.g. self-focused attention, on the other hand. The exercises will be conducted in smaller groups. Participants will be recruited from a community sample. They are invited to self-screen their public speaking anxiety to see if the intervention is suitable for them. The only exclusion criterion is not having the appropriate technical equipment for participation in a videoconference. Public speaking anxiety as well as cognitive facets of social phobia will be assessed two months before treatment, two days before and one day after treatment and at one month and six months follow up to investigate long-term effects of the intervention. Besides the aim of supporting a general feasibility and efficacy of the intervention, the study focusses on the role of expectancy violation. Recent theoretical frameworks suggest that expectancy violation is the core mechanism behind successful exposure therapy. Nevertheless, only a few studies to date manipulated expectancy violation experimentally to confirm its importance. Thus, participants in this study will be randomly allocated to two different treatment conditions. After completion of the treatment, one half of the participants will elaborate a worksheet that addresses basic contentual information concerning the treatment without a specific attempt to highlight the discrepancy between anticipated and actual outcomes. For example, participants will be asked how they would explain public speaking anxiety and exposure therapy to a friend and what advantages they see in conducting treatments like this in groups (BASIC task). The other group will receive a worksheet with questions aimed at enhancing the processing of what was learned during treatment in terms of expectancy violation. For example, they are asked if what they were most worried about occured and what actually happened compared to what they predicted to happen (EV task).

Conditions

Anxiety, Social

Keywords

large-group treatment; one-session treatment; online intervention; public speaking anxiety; expectancy violation

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcomes (1)

• change on self statements during public speaking scale (german version; Hofmann & Heinrichs, 2001)

  10 items, 6-point Likert scale (0 - 5), large change in a negative direction means better outcome

  two days before the intervention and one month after the intervention [compared to the change between the assessment time points after registration and two days before treatment]

Secondary Outcomes (3)

• change on self statements during public speaking scale (german version; Hofmann & Heinrichs, 2001)

  after registration for the study, two days before the intervention, one day after the intervention, one month after the intervention (already specified as primary outcome measure), six months after the intervention

• change on social cognitions questionnaire (german version; Stangier, Heidenreich, Ehlers, & Clark, 1996)

  after registration for the study, two days before the intervention, one day after the intervention, one month after the intervention, six months after the intervention

• change on fear of negative evaluation scale short form (german version; Kemper, Lutz, & Neuser, 2011)

  after registration for the study, two days before the intervention, one day after the intervention, one month after the intervention, six months after the intervention

Other Outcomes (6)

• change on positive mental health scale (german version; Lukat, Margraf, Lutz, van der Feld, & Becker, 2015)

  after registration for the study, two days before the intervention, one day after the intervention, one month after the intervention, six months after the intervention

• change on generalized self efficacy scale (german version; Schwarzer & Jerusalem, 1999)

  two days before the intervention, one day after the intervention, one month after the intervention, six months after the intervention

• change on satisfaction with life scale (german version; Glaesmer, Grande, Braehler, & Roth, 2011)

  two days before the intervention, one day after the intervention, one month after the intervention, six months after the intervention

Study Arms (2)

Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment exercise targeting expectancy violation

EXPERIMENTAL

Behavioral: Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment exercise targeting expectancy violation

Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment control exercise

ACTIVE COMPARATOR

Behavioral: Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment control exercise

Interventions

Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment exercise targeting expectancy violation BEHAVIORAL

The treatment is aimed at reducing public speaking anxiety by using cognitive and behavioral techniques. Following a psychoeducation phase, different speaking tasks are conducted to expose the individuals to their feared situation on the one hand and to address common cognitive processes characterizing public speaking anxiety, e.g. self-focused attention, on the other hand. The exercises will be conducted in smaller groups. After treatment, participants receive a worksheet with questions aimed at enhancing the processing of what was learned during treatment in terms of expectancy violation. For example, they are asked if what they were most worried about occured and what actually happened compared to what they predicted to happen. This should highlight the discrepancy between anticipated and actual outcomes. The intervention is conducted in an online group format via videoconference with a duration of approximately 5 hours.

Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment exercise targeting expectancy violation

Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment control exercise BEHAVIORAL

The treatment is aimed at reducing public speaking anxiety by using cognitive and behavioral techniques. Following a psychoeducation phase, different speaking tasks are conducted to expose the individuals to their feared situation on the one hand and to address common cognitive processes characterizing public speaking anxiety, e.g. self-focused attention, on the other hand. The exercises will be conducted in smaller groups. After treatment, participants receive a worksheet that addresses basic contentual information concerning the treatment without a specific attempt to highlight the discrepancy between anticipated and actual outcomes. For example, participants will be asked how they would explain public speaking anxiety and exposure therapy to a friend and what advantages they see in conducting treatments like this in groups. The intervention is conducted in an online group format via videoconference with a duration of approximately 5 hours.

Online large-group one-session treatment with post-treatment control exercise

Eligibility Criteria

• Age: 18 Years+
• Sex: all
• Healthy Volunteers: No
• Age Groups: Adult (18-64), Older Adult (65+)

You may qualify if:

• Aged 18 years or above
• participants self-screen their public speaking anxiety and generalized social anxiety; participation is recommended if public speaking anxiety is moderate to high and if generalized social anxiety is low (this criterion is not explicitly checked by the investigator as there is only a recommendation and participants can register even though they do not receive a recommendation for participation)

You may not qualify if:

• Not having the appropriate technical equipment for participation in a videoconference

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Ruhr University of Bochum: lead

Study Sites (1)

Ruhr-University of Bochum

Bochum, 44801, Germany

Location

MeSH Terms

Conditions

Anxiety Disorders

Condition Hierarchy (Ancestors)

Mental Disorders

Study Officials

• Svenja Schaumburg, M. Sc.

  Ruhr University of Bochum

  PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Study Design

• Study Type: interventional
• Phase: not applicable
• Allocation: RANDOMIZED
• Masking: SINGLE
• Who Masked: PARTICIPANT
• Masking Details: Participants are not aware that there are two different post-treatment exercises and are not informed that the aim of the EV condition is to promote expectancy violation.
• Purpose: TREATMENT
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Sponsor Type: OTHER
• Responsible Party: PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR
• PI Title: Principal Investigator (Research Fellow / PhD Student)

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: March 5, 2021
• First Posted: March 10, 2021
• Study Start: January 1, 2021
• Primary Completion: May 1, 2021
• Study Completion: October 4, 2021
• Last Updated: April 27, 2022

Record last verified: 2022-04

Data Sharing

• IPD Sharing: Will share

Locations

DE (1)