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Music Therapy's Impact on University Students' Social and Mental Health

NCT07024979 · Status: RECRUITING · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 20

Last updated 2025-09-23

No results posted yet for this study

Summary

In recent years, university education has become more challenging due to increased academic competition. A rising number of university students globally are currently being diagnosed with mental health problems, and previous research suggests that insufficient social support plays a significant role in the development of mental illnesses, such as symptoms of depression and anxiety. Music Therapy has been widely used in emotional regulation, offering a promising solution for people struggling with anxiety, depression, and social isolation. Research on the neural mechanisms underlying music therapy represents rapidly growing field of study. Hyperscanning is one of the useful neuroscience study methods, which is widely-used for study interbrain synchronization, refers to the simultaneous measurement of brain activity in two or more individuals who are interacting with each other. This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of music therapy intervention in enhancing mental health and social skills of university students with depressed, anxious, and stress symptoms. This current study will adopt a 2-arm randomized controlled design comparing therapeutic songwriting (experimental condition) with non-therapeutic music listening and discussion (control condition). Upon screening for inclusion criteria, baseline data will be collected; and eligible participants will be randomized into either 4 individual music therapy sessions or non-therapeutic music listening and discussion sessions.

Conditions

  • Depressive Symptoms
  • Anxiety
  • Stress

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Music Therapy Songwriting Intervention

The music therapy songwriting intervention is an active, client-centered music therapy approach in which the participant collaboratively create an original song with a professional music therapist. This evidence-based method combines: 1) lyric writing: the participant can express personal experience/emotions through guided lyric creation; 2) musical composition: the participant will choose or improvise their favorite melody, harmony, and rhythm with a music therapist; 3) therapeutic processing: discussion of song meaning and emotional connections between the participant and music therapist.

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • The University of Hong Kong

    lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

  • Wanru Zhao · The University of Hong Kong

Study Design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
DOUBLE
Model
PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age
18 Years
Max Age
35 Years
Sex
FEMALE
Healthy Volunteers
Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2025-02-10
Primary Completion
2025-12-31
Completion
2025-12-31

Countries

  • Hong Kong

Study Locations

More Related Trials

Entities

Diseases

Read the full study record

This page highlights key information. For complete eligibility criteria, study locations, investigator contacts, and the full protocol, visit the original record on ClinicalTrials.gov.

View NCT07024979 on ClinicalTrials.gov