The Impact of Dyad Exercises on Well-being and Connection in Young Adults

NCT05490979 | Completed

• 1 other identifier: #10085952
• Study Type: interventional
• Target: 120
• Locations: 1 country
• Sites: 1

Brief Summary

Many people are experiencing low well-being and loneliness, particularly due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As the world is opening back up, it is crucial to determine methods to help people grow closer again and boost subjective well-being. One promising method is contemplative dyad meditation, which has hardly been studied. This is a method in which two people have a structured dialogue with each other while contemplating a prompt, as they alternate between listening and speaking. It is related to but different from other methods that have previously been shown to increase connection, such as the "fast friends" exercise. In "fast friends", two people answer a series of increasingly personal questions in a dialogue. Here, 180 participants between 18-35 years will be randomly allocated to three conditions (stratified by gender): (a) contemplative dyad meditation training, (b) "fast friends", or (c) no-intervention. Participants in the dyad meditation group will receive professional meditation training followed by 2 weeks of regular meditation practice. Participants in the "fast friends" group will meet regularly during 2 weeks to practice "fast friends" exercises. The impact of the interventions on well-being, loneliness, mindfulness, and related measures will be investigated. After the interventions have finished, participants' physiology (heart rate) and brain waves (using electroencephalography \[EEG\]) during the respective exercises will also be measured to explore potential biological mechanisms. Of particular interest are heart rate variability (HRV, often linked with higher well-being), frontal alpha asymmetry in the EEG (linked with positive affect and approach), and biological synchrony in these variables between the two interacting individuals. Both dyad meditations and "fast friends" exercises are predicted to improve closeness, thriving, loneliness, affect, depression, anxiety, and social interaction anxiety compared to no-intervention. Moreover, dyad meditation is predicted to have stronger effects than "fast friends" in terms of increasing mindfulness, self-compassion, and empathy. Dyad meditation and fast friends will show differential physiological signatures (e.g., lower heart rate and higher averaged alpha power for meditation). This study may reveal effective methods to improve well-being and connection and provide insights into their biological mechanisms.

Conditions

Mental Health Wellness 1; Loneliness

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcomes (4)

• Brief Inventory of Thriving

  The Brief Inventory of Thriving (Su, Tay, \& Diener, 2014) is a questionnaire consisting of 10 items, measuring psychological well-being. Scores range from 1 to 5 with a higher score indicating more thriving (i.e., higher well-being).

  3 weeks

• Loneliness Scores on the Comprehensive Inventory of Thriving

  The Loneliness sub-scale from the Comprehensive Inventory of Thriving (Su, Tay, \& Diener, 2014) consists of 3 items. Scores range from 1 to 5 with a higher score indicating higher loneliness.

  3 weeks

• Mindfulness Score on the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire

  The Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (Baer et al., 2006) consists of 39 items. Scores for mindfulness range between 1 and 5 with a higher score indicating more mindfulness.

  3 weeks

• Inclusion of Other in the Self Scale

  The Inclusion of Other in the Self Scale (Aron, Aron, \& Smollan, 1992) consists of 7 response options measuring closeness to another person (here: the meditation or exercise partner). The response options each show two circles labeled as" "Self" and "Other", which vary in terms of overlap, from barely touching (1, i.e., not close at all) to almost completely overlapping (7, i.e., extremely close).

  Directly after each individual meditation or "fast friends" exercise

Secondary Outcomes (10)

• Positive Affect Scores on the Negative And Positive Affect Scale

  3 weeks

• Negative Affect Scores on the Negative And Positive Affect Scale

  3 weeks

• Depression Scores on the Patient Health Questionnaire-9

  3 weeks

• Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 questionnaire

  3 weeks

• Social Interaction Anxiety Scale-6

  3 weeks

Other Outcomes (4)

• Heart rate

  3 weeks

• Heart rate variability

  3 weeks

• Respiration

  3 weeks

Study Arms (3)

Contemplative dyad meditation

EXPERIMENTAL

Behavioral: Contemplative dyad meditation

Fast friends

ACTIVE COMPARATOR

Behavioral: Fast friends

No intervention

NO INTERVENTION

Interventions

Contemplative dyad meditation BEHAVIORAL

Participants take part in a 3-hour group meditation training led by a professional meditation teacher. They receive detailed instructions and also practice contemplative dyad meditation for at least 30 minutes with another participant. During the 2 weeks following the training, participants meet in supervised group settings to practice the meditation method with alternating partners for up to 6 times.

Contemplative dyad meditation

Fast friends BEHAVIORAL

During 2 weeks, participants meet in supervised group settings to practice the 'fast friends' exercise with alternating partners for up to 6 times.

Fast friends

Eligibility Criteria

• Age: 18 Years - 35 Years
• Sex: all
• Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Age Groups: Adult (18-64)

You may qualify if:

• Current student, staff, or employee at the University of Pennsylvania (for safety reasons)

You may not qualify if:

• none

Sponsors & Collaborators

• University of Pennsylvania: lead

Study Sites (1)

University of Pennsylvania

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19104, United States

Location

Study Officials

• Michael L Platt, PhD

  University of Pennsylvania

  PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Study Design

• Study Type: interventional
• Phase: not applicable
• Allocation: RANDOMIZED
• Masking: SINGLE
• Who Masked: PARTICIPANT
• Masking Details: Participants only receive information about the condition they have been assigned to and are not explicitly informed about the other conditions or the overall purpose of the study. All participants will be debriefed when the study has ended.
• Purpose: TREATMENT
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Sponsor Type: OTHER
• Responsible Party: PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR
• PI Title: James S. Riepe University Professor

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: August 4, 2022
• First Posted: August 8, 2022
• Study Start: September 6, 2022
• Primary Completion: June 22, 2023
• Study Completion: October 3, 2023
• Last Updated: October 5, 2023

Record last verified: 2023-10

Locations

US (1)