NCT06583096

College Student Stress: Transitions Over Time

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 120 (actual)
• Sponsor: University of Michigan · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 17 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

This research study is being conducted to better understand how college students develop and cope with stress and to identify opportunities to help students notice and respond to stress early before symptoms contribute to significant negative consequences. This project will be completed in two parts. In the first part (not a trial) participants will be asked to complete a screening survey to determine eligibility. Eligible participants (i.e., those with mild-to-moderate depressive symptoms and not receiving mental health care) will continue into the clinical trial portion (part two). There were 120 students in the clinical trial phase of the study, where 30 were randomly assigned to "assessment only" and 90 to the "intervention" condition.

Conditions

• Depressive Symptoms

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Surveys	Participants (in both arms) will complete surveys once per week and participants in the intervention arm will also complete additional 1-minute surveys daily. Study participation will be completed at the conclusion of the final follow-up survey administered 6-weeks after study enrollment.
BEHAVIORAL	Supportive Text messages	Text messages will be sent Mondays-Sunday if participants are randomized to receive them in a given week, with a daily 50:50 send/no-send randomization. A bank of 25 text messages will be used for the study, providing tips/strategies across a range of topics, including managing time and academic stressors, recommendations for self-care and mood management, and messages geared towards fostering social connections and support. Some messages will contain links to videos, websites, or articles for more information on a topic.
BEHAVIORAL	Personalized Feedback (PF) Report	For individuals that are randomized to receive a Personalized Feedback Report, the study team will send participants a text on a Monday with the feedback from the prior survey (baseline survey in the first week, weekly survey in the next five weeks). There will be graphs for depression, anxiety, stress, and flourishing.

Timeline

• Start date: 2024-10-01
• Primary completion: 2024-11-27
• Completion: 2024-11-27
• First posted: 2024-09-03
• Last updated: 2025-12-04
• Results posted: 2025-12-04

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States