A web-based intervention to decrease adolescents’ aggression during the COVID pandemic

BELÉN MESURADO; IGNACIO AGUINALDE; CLAUDIA E. VANNEY

Pittsburgh

Congreso; Internet Interventions 11th Scientific Meeting; 2022

International Society for Research on Internet Interventions

Context: During the lockdown measures, emotional distress increased among adolescents, raising levels of anxiety, depression and family conflicts. Previous studies have proposed that frustration (due, e.g, to the impossibility of socializing with peers, etc.) could increase aggression levels among them. The purpose of this study is to analyze if participating in the Hero web-based intervention will inhibit adolescents’ aggressive behavior during the pandemic. Moreover, we expect that aggresion will increase in the waiting list control group.Methods: To carry out this study, a pre-test, post-test design was used with a follow-up evaluation three months after finishing the intervention.The study included 190 adolescents from 12 to 15 years old from Argentina: 88 adolescents were included in the intervention group (51% females, M age = 13.52), and 102 adolescents in the control group (58% females, M age = 13.59).Physical and verbal aggression was measured with the Spanish version of Caprara and Pastorelli, 1993. It is a self-report instrument consisting of 20 items.Intervention (if relevant): Hero is a self-administered web-based intervention that can be completed from home. The Hero intervention includes five modules, each of which lasts approximately 45 minutes and promotes: empathy, gratitude, positive emotions (e.g. serenity, joy), forgiveness, and prosocial behavior.During administration of the program, the participant is guided by a “wise old man” who introduces the activities and helps adolescents in the tasks. The program includes psychoeducational videos and tasks aimed, for example, at identifying the emotion expressed by different children’s photos among others.Results: The LGCMs was used to study the trajectory of the aggression in the control and experimental group. The results indicated that aggressive behavior increased from pretest to follow-up in the control group (M pretest = 1.47, M post-test = 1.50, and M follow-up = 1.54), while aggression decreased from pretest to follow-up in the intervention group (M pre-test = 1.44, M post-test = 1.40, and M follow-up = 1.36) (see Table 1). Finally, we studied the effect of the intervention, gender, and age on the change of aggression. The model showed a good fit: X = 3.06, df = 6, p =.80, CFI = 1, TLI= 1, SRMR=.04. The effect of the Hero program on the reduction of aggression was significant (β =-.04, SE =.01, p =.001, R 28%), while the effects of gender and age werenot significant.Conclusions: Previous research has shown the Hero program was effective to promote positivedevelopments among adolescents, such as empathy, prosocial behaviors and positive emotions during the pandemic. However, this is the first empirical evidence that the program is also effective in discouraging aggressive behavior during pandemic.Implications: This study provides evidence along the lines of showing the important role that web-based interventions played in discouraging disruptive adolescent behaviors that could increase the psychological distress experienced during the COVID pandemic.