ai Chi Reduces Insomnia in College Students: Exploring Inflammatory Factor Roles

NCT06200805 | Completed

• 1 other identifier: WLan
• Study Type: interventional
• Target: 90
• Locations: 1 country
• Sites: 1

Brief Summary

College student volunteers were recruited from a university in Anhui Province, China, and screened by the Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI) scale, and those with PSQI scores higher than 7 were considered to have clinical insomnia, and insomniac college students screened were subjected to a 24-week 24-form taijiquan intervention, and the rest of the insomniac volunteers were randomly divided into the fast-walking group and the control group. As the most common form of physical exercise for college students and the easiest aerobic exercise, brisk walking was chosen as an intervention for insomniac college students to better compare the efficacy of tai chi with that of general aerobic exercise for insomnia. The taijiquan group performed taijiquan exercise three times a week for 60 minutes each time, the brisk walking group performed brisk walking training three times a week for 60 minutes each time, and the control group did not carry out any intervention and maintained a normal life and study status. Before the intervention, questionnaires were filled out and fasting elbow venous blood was drawn, and the staff uniformly explained the intervention-related contents and precautions, and after 24 weeks of intervention, the post-test questionnaires and fasting venous blood were filled out centrally.

Conditions

Students With Sleep Disorders

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcomes (2)

• Role effects of tai chi intervention in college students with insomnia

  Insomnia: measured by PSQI scale. The scale was developed by Buysse et al, a neurologist at the University of Pittsburgh, USA, and has an overall internal consistency Cronbach's ɑ coefficient of 0.83.The scale was used to assess the quality of sleep of an individual in the last month, and consists of 19 self-assessed and 5 other-assessed entries, for a total of 24 items, where the 19th entry and the five other-assessed entries do not participate in the scoring. The 18 scoring items include seven dimensions: subjective sleep quality, time to sleep, sleep efficiency, sleep disorders, hypnotic drug use, and daytime functioning. Each dimension is scored on a scale of 0-3, and the cumulative score is the total PSQI score, which ranges from 0-21, with higher scores indicating poorer sleep quality, and PSQI scores greater than 7 are considered clinical insomnia. Use of this scale to assess the improvement of insomnia in insomniac college students using taijiquan

  Minimum 12 weeks

• Changes in inflammatory factors before and after tai chi intervention

  Fasting elbow vein blood of 2 ml was collected from college students in the tai chi group, the fast walking group, and the control group. 2 ml of blood was tested using Luminex multifactor assay technology. The levels of IL-2, IL-4, IL-6, IL-10, TNF-ɑ, IFN-Y, IL-8, IL-13, and IL-1 in the supernatant were measured. Inflammatory factor data before and after exercise were analyzed in each group to observe the level of inflammatory factor changes before and after taijiquan intervention and to explore the role played by inflammatory factor changes in taijiquan intervention for insomniac college students.

  Minimum 12 weeks

Study Arms (3)

High Intensity Taijiquan Exercise Group

EXPERIMENTAL

60 minutes of tai chi exercise 5 times a week

Behavioral: tai ji quan

Moderate Intensity Taijiquan Exercise Group

EXPERIMENTAL

60 minutes of tai chi exercise 3 times a week

Behavioral: tai ji quan

control subjects

NO INTERVENTION

The control group did not implement any intervention and maintained a normal life and study status.

Interventions

tai ji quan BEHAVIORAL

24-Style Taijiquan as an Intervention for College Students with Insomnia

High Intensity Taijiquan Exercise Group; Moderate Intensity Taijiquan Exercise Group

Eligibility Criteria

• Age: 17 Years - 24 Years
• Sex: all
• Healthy Volunteers: No
• Age Groups: Child (0-17), Adult (18-64)

You may qualify if:

• Meet the diagnostic criteria of insomnia i.e. PSQI score ≥ 7;
• Age between 18 and 25 years old; ③ Exercise of the study subjects is low exercise i.e. PARS-3 score ≤ 19;
• Have not received any psychological and pharmacological treatments in the past one year;
• Have no visceral diseases, normal vision and hearing; ⑥ Have good physical fitness and can perform basic intensity of physical exercise; ⑦ Have signed the informed consent form.

You may not qualify if:

• Recent cardiovascular disease, musculoskeletal disease and other diseases that affect normal sports training;
• Serious mental illness; ③ Antibiotics within the past three months; ④ Serious autoimmune disease; ⑤ Those who refuse to participate in the research project.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Anhui Medical University: lead

Study Sites (1)

Anhui Medical University

Hefei, Anhui, 230000, China

Location

MeSH Terms

Interventions

Tai Ji

Intervention Hierarchy (Ancestors)

Mind-Body Therapies; Complementary Therapies; Therapeutics; Exercise Movement Techniques; Physical Therapy Modalities

Study Design

• Study Type: interventional
• Phase: not applicable
• Allocation: RANDOMIZED
• Masking: DOUBLE
• Who Masked: PARTICIPANT, INVESTIGATOR
• Purpose: TREATMENT
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Sponsor Type: OTHER
• Responsible Party: PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR
• PI Title: Chief Researcher

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: December 9, 2023
• First Posted: January 11, 2024
• Study Start: May 15, 2024
• Primary Completion: June 20, 2024
• Study Completion: July 20, 2024
• Last Updated: December 18, 2025

Record last verified: 2025-12

Locations

CN (1)