Social information processing in adolescents with eating disorders
Research type
Research Study
Full title
An investigation into social information processing in adolescents with eating disorders: Implications for theory and clinical practice
IRAS ID
229005
Contact name
Katie Rowlands
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
King's College London
Duration of Study in the UK
4 years, 2 months, 9 days
Research summary
PHASE ONE
Participants will be recruited from schools and specialist child and adolescent eating disorder units in England (inpatient, daycare, outpatient services). Participants will be eligible if they meet all inclusion criteria. Informed consent will be obtained from all participants and parental consent will also be obtained for any participants under the age of 16.
Eighty adolescents aged 13-17 with eating disorders (Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa, Binge Eating Disorder) and their unaffected parents, and eighty adolescents without eating disorders will complete some baseline questionnaires online using a secure website used widely for research (Qualtrics). Participants will also complete some computerised tasks on another website used widely for research (Inquisit), in which computerised tasks can be embedded and any data obtained is stored securely. These assessments aim to measure different ways of looking at and reading social signals from others (e.g. facial expressions and ambiguous social scenarios). After completion of these assessments, the healthy participants without eating disorders will be debriefed and reimbursed. Participation will last a maximum of three weeks including discussing the study, consenting, and completing baseline assessments.PHASE TWO
Participants with an eating disorder will also be reimbursed for completing the phase one assessments at this point, however they will not be debriefed. After completion of the phase one assessments participants with eating disorders will be allocated at random to one of two groups. An independent research coordinator will be responsible for randomising participants.
Participants allocated to one group will continue to receive their treatment as usual. Participants in the other group will receive a total of nine computerised training sessions and three guided goal-planning sessions, which will be facilitated by the researcher over a three week period. These participants will too continue to receive their treatment as usual and the training offered will not affect or influence their treatment in any way. The initial computerised training session will be completed face-to-face with the researcher at their treatment centre, so that the participants can be supported in familiarising themselves with how to complete the training modules. Following this initial session all of the computerised training sessions and guided goal planning sessions will be delivered online via the Inquisit website. The training modules will be delivered over a period of three consecutive weeks, however total participation will last twelve weeks. This is because all participants (in both the training group and the treatment as usual only group) will be asked to repeat the phase one assessment package three and twelve weeks after completing them for the first time in phase one. After completion of the twelve weeks all participants will receive their outstanding reimbursement.REC name
London - Riverside Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/LO/1867
Date of REC Opinion
8 Dec 2017
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion