CClinicalTrials.gg
CompletedNCT00073619Updated Jun 23, 2016

Preventing Anxiety Disorders in Urban Youth

An interventional study of Cognitive-behavioral group therapy in Anxiety Disorders, sponsored by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Completed at 1 site in United States. Open to participants aged 8 Years to 12 Years, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2016-06-23.

Sponsored by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health · Not applicable, Interventional, and Prevention

Phase
Not applicable
Study type
Interventional
Enrollment
200
Allocation
Randomized
Ages
8 Years to 12 Years
Sex
All
01

Study summary

This study will determine the effectiveness of a cognitive-behavioral group therapy program in preventing anxiety disorders in at-risk children exposed to community violence.

Read the detailed description

Community violence is a major public health problem in low-income, urban communities. The mental health impact of living in a violent community is significant, particularly for children. Community violence exposure is associated with various symptoms of anxiety. Unfortunately, little research on the prevention of community-related anxiety in youth has been conducted. This study involves a school-based prevention and cognitive behavioral therapy program that will involve predominantly African American children who live in urban areas and are at risk for developing anxiety disorders.

Children in this study will be randomly assigned to either an anxiety prevention and early intervention group or a nonintervention group for approximately 3 months. Child, parent, and teacher assessments of anxiety symptoms will be made at the end of the study and at a 6-month follow-up visit.

02

Conditions studied

  • Anxiety Disorders

Browse trials for

Keywords

  • Violence
  • School based
  • Urban Youth
  • Prevention
  • Community
03

In context

Anxiety Disorders

4,868 studies on the registry are indexed under Anxiety Disorders; 1,390 are open to participants now.

This study's enrollment of 200 is above the median of 80 across 4,174 interventional studies indexed under Anxiety Disorders.

Browse Anxiety Disorders studies →

Lead sponsor

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health is the lead sponsor of 364 studies on the registry; 41 are open to participants now.

Of its 5 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 3 (60%) have results posted.

Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.

04

Who can participate

Ages eligible
8 Years to 12 Years
Sexes eligible
All
Accepts healthy volunteers
Yes

Inclusion criteria

  • Mild exposure to community violence
  • Mild to moderate anxiety symptoms or disorders
  • Attending public elementary school in an urban area
  • In 3rd to 5th grades

Exclusion criteria

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-IV disruptive behavior disorder
  • Too many or too few anxiety symptoms
05

Study design

Phase
Not applicable
Primary purpose
Prevention
Allocation
Randomized
Intervention model
Parallel assignment
Masking
None (open label)
Enrollment
200 participants (actual)

Study arms

  • Experimental
    Cognitive-behavioral group therapy

    School-based anxiety preventive intervention (cognitive-behavioral group therapy) originally designed for Australian children that was culturally and contextually modified for inner-city children exposed to community violence. Participants received the weekly intervention and rewards for participating in the assessments.

    Behavioral: Cognitive-behavioral group therapy

  • No intervention
    Non-intervention Comparison

    Provide no active intervention to the comparison group, although assess the children at the same assessment points as the experimental group. Participants in the control arm were told they were FRIENDS Program participants.They received rewards for participating in the assessments.

Interventions

  • BehavioralCognitive-behavioral group therapy

    School-based anxiety preventive intervention (cognitive-behavioral group therapy) originally designed for Australian children that was culturally and contextually modified for inner-city children exposed to community violence. Participants received the weekly intervention and rewards for participating in the assessments.

06

What researchers measure

Primary outcomes

  1. Revised Children's Manifest Anxiety Scale

    Revised Children's Manifest Anxiety Scale (RCMAS; Reynolds \& Richmond, 1997), a self-report measure of the level and nature of anxiety in children and adolescents. It is a 37-item questionnaire in which students agree or disagree to statements pertaining to how some people think or feel about themselves, assessing different ways anxiety is manifested. A higher score indicates more anxiety and distress. The RCMAS has good internal consistency (alpha = 0.83) and test-retest reliability (r = 0.68). In the FRIENDS study, Total RCMAS reliability was alpha = 0.83 at baseline and alpha = 0.84 at post-assessment.

    Time frame: Past month

Secondary outcomes

  1. Wechsler Individual Achievement Test-Screener

    Academic achievement was assessed using the Wechsler Individual Achievement Test-Screener (WIAT-Screener; Psychological Corporation, 1992), which consists of three subtests of the comprehensive WIAT battery (i.e., Basic Reading, Mathematics Reasoning, Spelling). It assesses basic academic skills; permits the calculation of age- and grade-based standard scores; was standardized using a large representative sample; is widely used; and has demonstrated reliability and validity with little evidence of practice effects (Psychological Corporation, 1992).

    Time frame: Past year

  2. Multicultural Events Schedule for Adolescents

    Adverse life events were assessed using the Multicultural Events Schedule for Adolescents (MESA; Gonzales, Gunnoe, Samaniego, \& Jackson, 1995), developed to assess major and minor life events specific to an urban multiethnic population (Gonzales et al., 1995). It was normed on African American, European American, and English- and Spanish-speaking Mexican Americans. The MESA includes 84 items in which a student responds yes or no to each life events over the past year. A Total life events score is based on the number of events endorsed, with a higher score indicating more adverse life events and hassles. The MESA has adequate concurrent validity and test-retest reliability (Gonzales et al., 1995). In the FRIENDS project, the MESA Total score alpha = .89 at baseline, and alpha = .95 at the post-assessment.

    Time frame: Past year

  3. Children's Report of Exposure to Violence

    Children's Report of Exposure to Violence (CREV; Cooley, Turner, \& Beidel, 1995). The CREV is a widely used self-report questionnaire developed to assess children's lifetime exposure to community violence. It has good two-week test-retest reliability (r = 0.75), internal consistency (overall alpha = .78), and construct validity (Cooley et al., 1995). Twenty-nine scored CREV items are rated on a 5-point Likert scale, ranging from 0-''no, never'' to 4-''everyday,'' to indicate the frequency of exposure to community violence via four modes (i.e., media, hearsay, witness, victimization). Types of violent situations include being chased or threatened, beaten up, robbed or mugged, shot, stabbed, or killed. Higher scores indicate more perceived exposure. A past-year version of the CREV was developed and administered at the post-assessment evaluation. Cronbach's alpha for the lifetime CREV Total score was .88 at baseline and .90 for the past-year version.

    Time frame: Past year and Lifetime

07

Study locations

1 site
  • Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
    Baltimore, Maryland 21205, United States
08

References and documents

Publications

  • Lambert SF, Cooley MR, Campbell KD, Benoit MZ, Stansbury R. Assessing anxiety sensitivity in inner-city African American children: psychometric properties of the childhood anxiety sensitivity index. J Clin Child Adolesc Psychol. 2004 Jun;33(2):248-59. doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp3302_5. PubMed 15136188 ↗
  • Cooley MR, Boyce CA. An introduction to assessing anxiety in child and adolescent multiethnic populations: challenges and opportunities for enhancing knowledge and practice. J Clin Child Adolesc Psychol. 2004 Jun;33(2):210-5. doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp3302_1. PubMed 15136184 ↗
  • Cooley, M., Boyd, R.C., & Grados, J.J. (2004). Feasibility of an anxiety preventive intervention for community violence exposed children. The Journal of Primary Prevention, 25(1), 105-123.
  • Cooley-Strickland MR, Griffin RS, Darney D, Otte K, Ko J. Urban African American youth exposed to community violence: a school-based anxiety preventive intervention efficacy study. J Prev Interv Community. 2011;39(2):149-66. doi: 10.1080/10852352.2011.556573. PubMed 21480032 ↗

Individual participant data

Plan to share: No — There is no plan to make individual participant data available.

09

Updates

Tracking since Sep 25, 2026
No changes since tracking began. The registry record was last updated on Jun 23, 2016, before this site started recording changes on Sep 25, 2026. Its history is on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
10

Registry details

Key details

Study ID
NCT00073619
Lead sponsor
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Collaborators
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Responsible party
Sponsor
First posted
Dec 3, 2003
Start date
Dec 2001
Primary completion
Jul 2007
Completion
Jul 2011
Last update
Jun 23, 2016

Study contacts

Michele R Cooley, Ph.D.
principal investigator · Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Oversight

Data monitoring committee
No
View the source record on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗

Not currently enrolling

This study is completed, as verified in Jun 2016. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.

Follow this study

Get an email when the registry record changes — status, dates, results — or when someone posts here.

Sign in to follow

Discussion

Questions and observations about this study, from anyone following it. Not medical advice, and not a channel to the study team — their contact details are on the registry record.

Sign in to join the discussion. Reading takes no account; posting does. You choose a display name, and a pseudonym is the default.

Nothing here yet. If you are running this trial, taking part in it, or weighing whether to, this is the place to say so.

Start the discussion