Description

Rates of anxiety and depression in youth are substantial, causing a major unmet need for effective prevention and treatment. A salient risk factor for anxiety and depression is negative affectivity - a partially heritable propensity to experience and express more frequent, intense, and enduring aversive emotional states. Prior longitudinal studies have shown that elevated trait negative affectivity (tNA) during mid-adolescence predicted internalizing disorders later in adolescence and early adulthood, and this relation was partially mediated by changes in momentary negative affect (mNA) measured with ecological momentary assessment (EMA). The conceptual rationale for this investigation is as follows: Trait negative affectivity (tNA) is a risk factor for internalizing symptoms and disorders. tNA also predicts higher levels of momentary negative affect (mNA), measured with EMA, which in turn partially accounts for the prospective association between tNA and symptoms of anxiety and depression. Mindfulness interventions reduce both mNA and internalizing symptoms. Given these empirical relations, this study will test whether in youth with high levels of tNA, an online, coached mindfulness program reduces mNA, as measured with EMA, and whether significantly reducing mNA via a mindfulness intervention then prevents the worsening or onset of internalizing problems.

Mindfulness-based interventions have been found to reduce negative affect and internalizing symptoms in children and adolescents. This study will evaluate changes in mNA as a transdiagnostic target of mindfulness-based training in youth at high risk (i.e., high tNA) for internalizing problems, and the degree to which reductions in such mNA partially account for the effects of mindfulness training on internalizing outcomes in youth. This randomized controlled prevention trial will test the extent to which youth assigned to an online, coached mindfulness program as compared to youth in a supportive attention comparison intervention and a no-intervention control condition will show reduced mNA and its two components -- stressor-independent and stressor-reactive momentary negative affect. The mindfulness training will be implemented through mobile technology (e.g., online program). Investigating the efficacy of an online mode of delivery of mindfulness with support of a coach can advance the prevention of internalizing psychopathology in a manner that could be disseminated broadly. Such technology would improve access to care for youth who can be easily identified as being vulnerable to internalizing problems due to having high levels of tNA.