Clinical trial NCT03487081: Neural Predictors of Social Emotion Regulation Training
Official title: Neural Predictors of Social Emotion Regulation Training
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: COMPLETED
Phase: NA
Conditions: Emotions
Rumination
Lead sponsor: Columbia University
Sponsor class: OTHER
Collaborators: name: National Institute on Aging (NIA)
First posted: 2018-04-03
Enrollment: 62
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 18
Maximum age (years): 35
Standard ages: ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: yes
Allocation: RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: PARALLEL
Primary purpose: BASIC_SCIENCE

Brief summary: The purpose of this study is to investigate the basic psychological and neural mechanisms underlying the social regulation of emotion - that is, how one person's actions can impact, or regulate - the emotions of another person - and how this ability changes with practice. As such, this study is not designed to directly address clinical health outcomes and provide no treatment or intervention.

Detailed description: Prior research has demonstrated that helping others regulate their emotions has benefits for the support provider. But little is known about the basic brain mechanisms underlying this ability or how this ability can change with practice. To address these questions, this study has two parts. In the first, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is used to gain insight into the brain systems involved in helping others regulate negative emotions by comparing them to the brain systems involved in regulating the participants' own negative emotions. In the second part, participants engage in three weeks of structured practice, or training, in either socially regulating others' emotions or in self-regulating their own emotions. The investigators predict that helping others regulate their emotions will involve many of the same brain regions implicated in regulating one's own emotions, in addition to regions involved in perspective taking and the reward of helping others. Further, when relating the brain data from part 1 to the regulation practice data from part 2, the investigators expect that individuals who in part 1 show greater activity in brain regions supporting either social or self-regulation may be more likely in part 2 to show corresponding improvements in regulation performance. The results of these studies are intended to lay the groundwork for future studies investigating the social regulation of emotion in older adults and clinical populations for whom social support can be beneficial.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

* Native English speaker
* Right handed

Exclusion Criteria:

* Current or past history of neurological or psychiatric illness
* Use of psychoactive drugs
* Individuals who have metal devices or implants that cannot be removed from their body (e.g., piercings, pacemakers, copper intrauterine devices (IUDs))
* Pregnant women

Primary outcomes:
measure: Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ) Score
timeFrame: Change from baseline at 3 weeks follow up
measure: Ruminative Response Scale (RRS) Score
timeFrame: Change from baseline at 3 weeks follow up
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Change in mood rating (Likert scale score)
timeFrame: Baseline, up to 3 weeks
measure: Change in Brief State Rumination Inventory (BSRI) (Likert scale score)
timeFrame: Baseline, up to 3 weeks
measure: State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) - Trait Scale (Likert scale score)
timeFrame: Change from baseline at 3 weeks follow up
measure: Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D) (Likert scale score)
timeFrame: Change from baseline at 3 weeks follow up
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: New York
country: United States
facility: Columbia University
state: New York
Study officials:
affiliation: Department of Psychology, Columbia University
name: Kevin Ochsner, PhD
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References: