Evaluation of a preventive intervention for child anxiety in two randomized attention-control school trials

• Published in: Behaviour research and therapy Vol. 49; no. 5; pp. 315 - 323
• Main Authors: Miller, Lynn D., Laye-Gindhu, Aviva, Liu, Yan, March, John S., Thordarson, Dana S., Garland, E. Jane
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Kidlington Elsevier Ltd 01.05.2011; Elsevier; Elsevier Science Ltd
• Subjects: Anxiety; Anxiety - prevention & control; Anxiety - therapy; Attention; Attention control; Behavior modification; Behavior therapy. Cognitive therapy; Biological and medical sciences; Child; Children; Children & youth; Classrooms; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive behaviour therapy; Cognitive Therapy; Effectiveness research; Female; Friends; Humans; Intervention; Male; Medical sciences; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; School-based interventions; Schools; Social Environment; Symptoms; Treatment Outcome; Treatments; Canada; North America; America; School-based interventions; Effectiveness research; Anxiety; Attention control; Human; Social environment; Evaluation; Cognitive therapy; Treatment efficiency; Attention; Mental health; Anxiety disorder; Cognition; School environment; Prevention; Treatment; School age; Follow up study; Behavior therapy; Therapeutic schedule; Child; Cognitive control; Public health
• ISSN: 0005-7967; 1873-622X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2011.02.006

The present research examined the effectiveness of a cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) based intervention program, FRIENDS, for children from grades 4 to 6, using random assignment at the school-level and an attention-control design in two longitudinal studies. The first study targeted children with anxiety symptoms ( N = 191, mean age = 10.1) as screened with self, parent, and teacher-reports; the second study took a universal approach with full classrooms of children participating ( N = 253, mean age = 9.8). The results showed no intervention effect in both studies, with children’s anxiety symptoms decreasing over time regardless of whether they were in the story-reading (attention control) or FRIENDS condition. The findings also indicated that girls reported a higher level of anxiety than boys and children in higher grades reported lower anxiety relative to younger children in both studies. In addition, similar patterns were found using a subgroup of children with high-anxiety symptoms from both studies.