An interventional study of Funny/Amusing Video Clips and Horror/Scary Video Clips in Other Gastrointestinal Disorders and Cramp, Abdominal, sponsored by Old Dominion University. Completed at 1 site in United States. Open to participants aged 18 Years to 55 Years, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-10-16.
Sponsored by Old Dominion University · Not applicable, Interventional, and Basic science
Many athletes anecdotally report modifying their nutritional intake before competition in order to avoid gut problems, but no studies have evaluated whether emotional state impacts tolerance to pre-exercise feeding. Therefore, this study will use movie clips (stressful, horror, and funny/amusing) to induce different mood states and emotions, which will be followed by ingestion of food before endurance running on a treadmill. In addition, metabolic and physiologic responses to mood induction will be evaluated.
127 studies on the registry are indexed under Colic; 18 are open to participants now.
This study's enrollment of 28 is below the median of 76 across 110 interventional studies indexed under Colic.
Browse Colic studies →Old Dominion University is the lead sponsor of 27 studies on the registry; 4 are open to participants now.
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Exclusion Criteria:
Participants will watch 5-7-min video clips that are meant to be funny/amusing
Other: Funny/Amusing Video Clips
Participants will watch 5-7-min video clips that are meant to be scary
Other: Horror/Scary Video Clips
Participants will watch 5-7-min video clips that are meant to be thrilling/suspenseful
Other: Thrilling/Suspenseful Video Clips
Participants watch 5-7 minutes of video clips that are funny/amusing in nature
Participants watch 5-7 minutes of video clips that are scary in nature
Participants watch 5-7 minutes of video clips that are thrilling/suspenseful in nature
Total exercise gastrointestinal symptom burden
The severity of several gastrointestinal symptoms will be assessed on a validated 0-10 scale. Ratings will be collected every 5 minutes during a 30-minute treadmill jogging/running test. Scores from every 5-minute collection will be summed to calculate total GI symptom scores.
Time frame: Total GI symptom burden over a 30-minute jogging/running protocol.
Change in emotion ratings
Anxiety, fear, happiness, amusement, disgust, sadness, and anger on a 0-9 Likert scale. Emotions will be assessed before watching video clips and immediately after watching video clips.
Time frame: Change in emotion ratings between immediately pre-video and immediately post-video.
Change over time in exercise heart rate
Heart rate will be measured with a chest-strap (Polar) monitor.
Time frame: Heart rate will be measured throughout a 30-minute treadmill jogging/running test. Change over time will be evaluated using mixed ANOVA.
Substrate use
Carbohydrate and fat oxidation rates will be estimated from the volumes of oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production during exercise
Time frame: Carbohydrate and fat oxidation rates will be measured during the last 5 min of a 30-minute treadmill jogging/running test.
Feeling Scale
The Feeling Scale is a bipolar numerical rating scale ranging from -5 to +5, with descriptors of "very bad" at -5, "neutral" at 0, and "very good" at +5.
Time frame: Ratings on the Feeling Scale will be measured at rest before watching video clips and throughout (every 5 min) a subsequent 30-minute treadmill jogging/running test.
Fatigue Scale
The Fatigue Scale is Likert-type scale that ranges from 0 (Not Fatigued at All) to 10 (Total Fatigue).
Time frame: Ratings on the Fatigue Scale will be measured at rest before watching video clips and throughout (every 5 min) a subsequent 30-minute treadmill jogging/running test.
Heart rate post-video
Heart rate will be measured with a chest-strap (Polar) monitor.
Time frame: Heart rate will be recorded immediately after videos are viewed.
Plan to share: Undecided
No publications or documents are linked to this record.
From the registry record's own update history. This site started tracking changes on Sep 25, 2026; for anything earlier, see the record history on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
This study is completed, as verified in Oct 2026. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.
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Old Dominion University