Psychotherapy for Young Adults With Mild-to-moderate Depression: Does Virtual Reality Increase Its Efficacy

Summary

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is the most prestigious psychological treatment for depression. However, not only do we need to increase its efficacy but also to widen the repertoire of evidence-based psychotherapeutic interventions. The importance of the patient's engagement in treatment is highlighted in the literature as a key factor for a good therapeutic outcome over and above the type of therapy. In this sense, personal construct therapy (PCT), with some promising supporting evidence, is particularly suited to fit the personal values and attitudes of each patient. In contrast to CBT, PCT does not educate patients about depression and give them directions on the changes to be made in their dysfunctional behaviors or cognitions. Rather, PCT explores their coherence with respect to the person's sense of identity, their construction of self and others, and works with the conflicts or dilemmas that appear during this conjoint exploration using the Repertory Grid Technique (RGT). In this project, for the first time, the RGT will be implemented using Virtual Reality (VR). This format could be highly appealing for young people, thus facilitating their involvement in therapy. The efficacy of this innovative application of PCT using VR (PCT-VR) will be compared to usual PCT, and to CBT in a randomized clinical trial. The Beck Depression Inventory-II is the primary outcome measure for calculating both statistical and clinical significance, but other measures will also be used at pre-, post-therapy and six-month follow up. The trial will be done in a natural health context, mostly the usual primary care center of each patient, with those who consult during the active period of the study.

Our research group has been working on both depression and personal construct theory for more than two decades (this includes our previous funded projects), particularly with a dilemma-focused intervention aimed to resolve the cognitive conflicts detected with the RGT. By fostering a technological innovation with VR, it is expected to boost the current efficacy of psychotherapy by increasing the engagement of young people and obtaining better outcomes. If these goals are met, a pathological evolution of the patient with its associated personal, health and social costs could be avoided.

Conditions

• Depression

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Cognitive-behavioral therapy

10 individual one-hour sessions, with one or two booster sessions at about three months after the tenth session

BEHAVIORAL

Personal Construct Therapy

10 individual one-hour sessions, with one or two booster sessions at about three months after the tenth session

BEHAVIORAL

Personal Construct Therapy with virtual reality

10 individual one-hour sessions, with one or two booster sessions at about three months after the tenth session

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Universitat Oberta de Catalunya

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Barcelona

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Guillem Feixas, Ph.D · University of Barcelona

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

TRIPLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

29 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2021-10-15

Primary Completion

2023-07-31

Completion

2024-07-31

Countries

• Spain

Study Locations