Free From Abuse: The Booster Project

Study Overview
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Brief Summary
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This project is designed to develop and test a brief internet-delivered intervention to promote healthy relationships among young adults.

Detailed Description
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In spite of the fact that young adults are at an increased risk of experiencing and perpetrating intimate partner violence (IPV), there is a lack of universal and widely accessible prevention programmes targeted at this age group. One of the reasons for this may be that it is difficult to deliver a universal prevention to individuals who are not formally grouped through one organisation, such as employed young adults. Those who are formally grouped, such as university students, are unlikely to take part in a lengthy prevention programme which is not a part of an official curriculum. Therefore, there is a need for widely available, accessible, and efficacious IPV prevention programmes that could be appropriate for all young adults regardless of gender. Since many young adults in contemporary Western societies were exposed to some kind of relationship education in schools, it may be that a brief programme will suffice to further boost their awareness of IPV and reduce IPV perpetration and victimisation risk. Therefore, we propose a brief internet-based intervention, Free From Abuse - The Booster Project, to achieve these objectives. Primary objectives: To investigate the acceptability and feasibility of the internet-delivered intervention to university students (determined using the 1 and 4-week follow-up rates, % of participants who correctly answered control questions assessing compliance); To assess the acceptability and feasibility of the outcome measures as methods to measure effectiveness of the intervention within a definitive trial (determined using % of missing data); To estimate the standard deviation (SD) for the continuous outcomes to inform sample size calculations for a definitive trial. Secondary objective: 1. To evaluate the potential effectiveness of the brief internet-delivered intervention, Free From Abuse - The Booster Project, in increasing recognition of abusive behaviour, as well as reducing acceptance of myths about domestic violence, abuse perpetration, and abuse victimisation among young university students compared with placebo.

Official Title
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A Brief Internet-delivered Intervention to Promote Healthy Relationships Among Young Adults: A Randomised Placebo-controlled Pilot Study

Conditions
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Violence, Gender-Based, Violence, Domestic

Intervention / Treatment
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* Other: Free From Abuse
* Other: Technology and crime


Participation Criteria
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Eligibility Criteria
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Inclusion Criteria: Participants must be university students aged between 18-24 years, reside in the UK, have access to a computer and internet connection, and be fluent in English. Exclusion Criteria: Participants will not be eligible to enrol in the trial if they have visual and/or auditory deficits with regards to watching video clips.

Ages Eligible for Study
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Minimum Age: 18 Years
Maximum Age: 24 Years

Sexes Eligible for Study
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All

Accepts Healthy Volunteers
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Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Study Plan
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How is the study designed?
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Design Details

Primary Purpose: Prevention
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention Model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: Double


Arms and Interventions

| Participant Group/Arm | Intervention/Treatment |
| --- | --- |
| Experimental: Free From Abuse<br>This is a brief internet-delivered intervention designed to boost participants' ability to recognise abusive behaviour, reduce acceptance of myths related to domestic violence and IPV, as well as decrease abuse perpetration and victimisation. | Other: Free From Abuse<br>* Participants in the treatment arm will watch a 15-minute talk given by an adult female survivor of IPV who tells the story of her abusive relationship. After watching the video, participants will read information on 10 signs of an unhealthy relationship. The intervention will take approximately 25 minutes to complete.<br>|
| Placebo Comparator: Technology and crime<br>This is a brief internet-delivered placebo intervention designed to inform participants about how the development of technology could affect crime. | Other: Technology and crime<br>* Participants in the placebo control arm will watch a 19-minute talk on technology development and crime. After watching the video, participants will read 10 facts about cyber security. The intervention will take approximately 25 minutes to complete.<br>|

What is the study measuring?
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Primary Outcome Measures

| Outcome Measure | Measure Description | Time Frame |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Change in recognition of abusive behaviour | Recognition of adolescent relationship abuse (ARA) scale (Rothman, Decker, & Silverman, 2006); scores on this 12-item self-report scale range from 12 to 60, with higher scores indicating an increased recognition of abusive behaviour | baseline, immediately post intervention - an average of 1 hour, 1 week, 4 weeks | 
| Change in acceptance of myths about domestic violence | Domestic Violence Myth Acceptance Scale (DVMAS; Peters, 2008); scores on this 18-item self-report scale range from 18 to 108, with higher scores indicating an increased acceptance of myths about domestic violence | baseline, immediately post intervention - an average of 1 hour, 1 week, 4 weeks | 

Secondary Outcome Measures

| Outcome Measure | Measure Description | Time Frame |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Change in abuse perpetration | Safe Dates - Psychological Abuse Perpetration scale (Foshee et al., 1996, 1998); scores on this 14-item self-report scale range from 14 to 56, with higher scores indicating an increased abuse perpetration | baseline, 4 weeks | 
| Change in abuse victimisation | 14-item Safe Dates - Psychological Abuse Victimisation scale (Foshee et al., 1996, 1998); scores on this 14-item self-report scale range from 14 to 56, with higher scores indicating an increased abuse victimisation | baseline, 4 weeks | 

 Terms related to the study
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Keywords Provided by Centre Hospitalier Valida
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Interpersonal partner violence, Dating violence, Internet-delivered intervention