Manage Emotions to Reduce Aggression (MERA)

Summary

PTSD is one of the most prevalent mental health conditions affecting Veterans who have served since 9/11. Veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) report difficulty controlling impulsive aggression (IA). An inability to manage one's emotions (emotion dysregulation) is an underlying mechanism of IA. Reducing IA and increasing use of PTSD evidence-based psychotherapies are two critical missions for the Veterans Health Administration. The proposed research supports these missions by comparing a 3- session emotion regulation treatment (Manage Emotions to Reduce Aggression) to a control group in order to determine if MERA can reduce IA and prepare Veterans for PTSD treatment. By enhancing Veterans' abilities to cope with trauma-related emotions and feel equipped to initiate PTSD treatments, this research aims to help Veterans decrease IA and ultimately recover from PTSD.

Conditions

• Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic
• Aggression
• Emotion Regulation

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Manage Emotions to Reduce Aggression

MERA begins with education about the adaptive nature of emotions, how childhood and military experiences can influence emotion regulation, and how combat requires different emotion regulation strategies than most civilian environments. MERA use modeling and practice with feedback to teach cognitive-behavioral and acceptance-based emotion regulation skills.

BEHAVIORAL

Present Centered Psychotherapy

PCT will serve as the comparison group. PCT assists Veterans in understanding and coping with current difficulties, such as aggression, but does not provide systematic training in emotion regulation skills.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center

  collaborator FED

• University of South Florida

  collaborator OTHER

• VA Boston Healthcare System

  collaborator FED

• University of Houston

  collaborator OTHER

• Texas A&M University

  collaborator OTHER

• VA Office of Research and Development

  lead FED

Principal Investigators

• Shannon R. Miles, PhD · James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital, Tampa, FL

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

TRIPLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

64 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2022-01-03

Primary Completion

2026-06-01

Completion

2026-06-30

Countries

• United States

Study Locations