Heartache and Backache- An Online Intervention Addressing Emotional and Physical Pain

Summary

This study is designed to determine if a brief educational program and a written emotional disclosure task can improve chronic back/neck pain-related outcomes and change pain beliefs and other processes in individuals with chronic back pain.

Individuals will be randomly assigned to an experimental condition (pain and affect neuroscience education) or a control condition (general health activities questionnaire), and then subsequently randomized to a second experimental condition (written emotional disclosure) or a control condition (writing about healthy habits).

Analyses will examine the main and interactive effects of the pain and affect neuroscience education and written emotional disclosure on improved pain-related outcomes at 1-month follow-up. Participants in both the experimental conditions are expected to show more improvement on pain severity, pain interference, psychological distress and psychological attitudes toward pain at follow-up, relative to participants in the control groups.

Conditions

• Chronic Pain (Back / Neck)

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Pain Psychology Neuroscience + Written Emotional Disclosure

A 15 to 20-minute exercise which they examine variables in themselves that suggest that their pain is driven by central nervous system processes. Participants will then write for 20 minutes about their very deepest thoughts and feelings about the most traumatic experience of their lives. A 10-minute break followed by writing again for 20 minutes about how they have come to understand what happened and how they have changed because of the event.

BEHAVIORAL

Pain Psychology Neuroscience + Healthy Habits Disclosure

This condition is a 15 to 20-minute exercise that patients complete in which they examine variables in themselves that suggest that their pain is driven by central nervous system processes in their brains. Followed by writing for 20 minutes a letter to a person of their choosing describing healthy behaviors, a 10 minute break and then a second 20 minute writing task describing a time when they performed a healthy behavior.

BEHAVIORAL

Health Behavior Control + Written Emotional Disclosure

This 15 to 20-minute exercise that relates to healthy behaviors. Participants are asked to examine various domains of their own health behavior as engaged in over the past 24 hours (e.g., nutrition, sleep, exercise, hygiene, social connections). Participants will then write for 20 minutes about their very deepest thoughts and feelings about the most traumatic experience of their lives. A 10-minute break followed by writing again for 20 minutes about how they have come to understand what happened and how they have changed because of the event.

BEHAVIORAL

Health Behavior Control + Healthy Habits Disclosure

This 15 to 20-minute exercise that relates to healthy behaviors. Participants are asked to examine various domains of their own health behavior as engaged in over the past 24 hours (e.g., nutrition, sleep, exercise, hygiene, social connections). Followed by writing for 20 minutes a letter to a person of their choosing describing healthy behaviors, a 10 minute break and then a second 20 minute writing task describing a time when they performed a healthy behavior.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• The New School for Social Research

  collaborator OTHER

• Wayne State University

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Mark Lumley, PhD · Wayne State University

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

TRIPLE

Model

FACTORIAL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

75 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2022-12-15

Primary Completion

2024-12-30

Completion

2024-12-30

Countries

• United States

Study Locations