Can an app designed to reduce repetitive negative thinking decrease depression and anxiety in young people? Results from a randomized controlled prevention trial

Funk, Julia ; Kopf-Beck, Johannes ; Takano, Keisuke ; Watkins, Edward und Ehring, Thomas (2025): Can an app designed to reduce repetitive negative thinking decrease depression and anxiety in young people? Results from a randomized controlled prevention trial. In: Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, Bd. 87, 102014

Abstract

Background and objectives: Rates of mental health disorders are rising among adolescents and young adults. Therefore, scalable methods for preventing psychopathology in these age groups are needed. As repetitive negative thinking (RNT) is a risk factor for depression and anxiety disorders, targeting RNT via smartphone app promises to be an effective, scalable strategy. The current three-arm, parallel group, randomized controlled trial tested whether a self-help app designed to reduce RNT decreased psychopathological symptoms and RNT in adolescents and young adults at risk for mental disorders.

Method: A sample of 16–22-year-olds with elevated levels of RNT (N = 365) were randomly allocated to either use a one of two self-help apps designed to reduce RNT for 6 weeks or to a waitlist. The full RNT-focused intervention app encompassed a variety of RNT-reducing strategies, whereas the concreteness training app focused on one of these strategies, namely, concrete thinking.

Results: The apps did not decrease depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms and RNT relative to the waitlist. However, exploratory analyses using a minimum dose criterion showed that participants who used the full-RNT-focused intervention app more often, reported greater baseline to follow-up decreases in depressive symptoms compared to waitlist.

Limitations: Include decreased power due to slightly more dropout than expected and limited generalizability due to the mostly female and highly educated sample.

Conclusions: RNT-focused prevention via a self-help app did not decrease depression and anxiety, presumably due to too little engagement with the app content provided.

• Dokumententyp: Zeitschriftenartikel
• Fakultät: Psychologie und Pädagogik > Department Psychologie > Klinische Psychologie und Psychotherapie
• Themengebiete: 100 Philosophie und Psychologie > 150 Psychologie
• ISSN: 0005-7916
• Sprache: Englisch