2016-2017 Faculty Research Grant
Harvey Burnett (Behavioral Sciences)
Examining the Efficacy of Psychology First Aid on Anxiety, Mood, Physiological Responses, and Resilience
This study will examine the efficacy of psychological first aid (PFA) on anxiety, mood, resilience and electrodermal activity compared to a social acknowledgement condition and expressive writing condition through a randomized controlled trail.
A minimum of 120 volunteer subjects from the Behavioral Sciences Research Subjects Pool will be randomly assigned to one of four experimental group conditions after talking about a stressful event: RAPID-PFA, social acknowledgement, expressive writing or superficial writing conditions. A demographic questionnaire, the State Trait Anxiety Scale (STAI-S), the Brief Profile of Mood States (POMS), the Response to Stressful Events Scale (RSES), and galvanic skin response (GSR) will be used to analyze anxiety, mood, resilience, and electrodermal activity across four time events: baseline, immediately after post-disclosure, 30 minutes post-disclosure, and 30 days post-disclosure.
Results are expected to show significantly lower anxiety and mood states, and significantly lower GRS across time post-disclosure for the PFA and expressive writing groups compared to controls. Resilience scores are expected to remain stable across time post-disclosure. PFA and expressive writing conditions are expected to be compatible models of crisis intervention.