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An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial

BACKGROUND: Student mobility across borders poses challenges to health systems at the university and country levels. International students suffer from stress more than their local peers, however, do not seek help or underutilize existing help offers. Some barriers to help-seeking among internationa...

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Autores principales: Balci, Sumeyye, Küchler, Ann-Marie, Ebert, David Daniel, Baumeister, Harald
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PsychOpen 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10508251/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37732147
http://dx.doi.org/10.32872/cpe.9341
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author Balci, Sumeyye
Küchler, Ann-Marie
Ebert, David Daniel
Baumeister, Harald
author_facet Balci, Sumeyye
Küchler, Ann-Marie
Ebert, David Daniel
Baumeister, Harald
author_sort Balci, Sumeyye
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Student mobility across borders poses challenges to health systems at the university and country levels. International students suffer from stress more than their local peers, however, do not seek help or underutilize existing help offers. Some barriers to help-seeking among international students are insufficient information regarding the health offers, stigma, and language, which might be overcome via culturally adapted internet and mobile-based interventions (IMI). METHOD: A randomized controlled feasibility trial with a parallel design assessed the feasibility and potential efficacy of an online mindfulness intervention adapted for international university students. Participants were randomized into either an adapted online mindfulness intervention (StudiCareM-E) (IG, n = 20) or a waitlist control group (WL, n = 20). Participants were assessed at baseline (t0) and eight-week post-randomization (t1). The feasibility of StudiCareM-E was evaluated regarding intervention adherence, client satisfaction, and potential negative effects. The potential efficacy of StudiCareM-E was measured by means of the level of mindfulness, perceived stress, depression, anxiety, presenteeism, and wellbeing. Efficacy outcomes were evaluated with regression models on the intention-to-treat (ITT) sample (n = 40), adjusting for the baseline values. RESULTS: Participants’ formative feedback suggested improvements in the content of the IMI. There were no crucial negative effects compared to WL. Assessment dropout was 35% (IG: 50%: WL: 20%), and intervention dropout was 60%. StudiCareM-E yielded significant improvements in mindfulness (β = .34), well-being (β = .37), and anxiety (β = -.42) compared to WL. CONCLUSION: StudiCareM-E might be used among culturally diverse international student populations to improve their well-being. Future studies might carefully inspect the extent of the adaptation needs of their target group and design their interventions accordingly.
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spelling pubmed-105082512023-09-20 An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial Balci, Sumeyye Küchler, Ann-Marie Ebert, David Daniel Baumeister, Harald Clin Psychol Eur Research Articles BACKGROUND: Student mobility across borders poses challenges to health systems at the university and country levels. International students suffer from stress more than their local peers, however, do not seek help or underutilize existing help offers. Some barriers to help-seeking among international students are insufficient information regarding the health offers, stigma, and language, which might be overcome via culturally adapted internet and mobile-based interventions (IMI). METHOD: A randomized controlled feasibility trial with a parallel design assessed the feasibility and potential efficacy of an online mindfulness intervention adapted for international university students. Participants were randomized into either an adapted online mindfulness intervention (StudiCareM-E) (IG, n = 20) or a waitlist control group (WL, n = 20). Participants were assessed at baseline (t0) and eight-week post-randomization (t1). The feasibility of StudiCareM-E was evaluated regarding intervention adherence, client satisfaction, and potential negative effects. The potential efficacy of StudiCareM-E was measured by means of the level of mindfulness, perceived stress, depression, anxiety, presenteeism, and wellbeing. Efficacy outcomes were evaluated with regression models on the intention-to-treat (ITT) sample (n = 40), adjusting for the baseline values. RESULTS: Participants’ formative feedback suggested improvements in the content of the IMI. There were no crucial negative effects compared to WL. Assessment dropout was 35% (IG: 50%: WL: 20%), and intervention dropout was 60%. StudiCareM-E yielded significant improvements in mindfulness (β = .34), well-being (β = .37), and anxiety (β = -.42) compared to WL. CONCLUSION: StudiCareM-E might be used among culturally diverse international student populations to improve their well-being. Future studies might carefully inspect the extent of the adaptation needs of their target group and design their interventions accordingly. PsychOpen 2023-06-29 /pmc/articles/PMC10508251/ /pubmed/37732147 http://dx.doi.org/10.32872/cpe.9341 Text en https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Balci, Sumeyye
Küchler, Ann-Marie
Ebert, David Daniel
Baumeister, Harald
An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial
title An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial
title_full An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial
title_fullStr An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial
title_full_unstemmed An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial
title_short An Online Mindfulness Intervention for International Students: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial
title_sort online mindfulness intervention for international students: a randomized controlled feasibility trial
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10508251/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37732147
http://dx.doi.org/10.32872/cpe.9341
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