Minority Stress Counseling for LGBTQ+ Individuals
For patients and families
In plain language
An automatic summary of structured registry data. It is an orientation aid, not a substitute for the official protocol or a physician assessment.
- What is being studied
- The protocol lists: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Treatment as Usual (TAU).
- Who it may be relevant to
- Registry conditions: Minority Stress. Basic parameters: from 18 years · All.
- What needs checking
- Age, condition and sex are only basic indicators. Prior treatment, laboratory values and other mandatory requirements appear in the eligibility criteria below.
- Where it takes place
- United States
- Next step
- Save the trial, show it to the treating physician, and confirm current recruitment with the study center. Costs, documents and travel →
Unsure about the terms? Read our patient guide →
Overview
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer+ (LGBTQ+) individuals experience a breadth of mental health disparities. Reducing these disparities is an area of key psychological research. Minority stress is theorized to be an underlying source of the disparities (Meyer, 2003). Minority stress can be conceptualized as the internalized stigma that results from experiences of social marginalization. By reducing minority stress, it is hypothesized that generalized mental illness indicators might be reduced and indicators of wellbeing increased.
Detailed description
Adult participants will respond to advertisements by emailing a research assistant.
A research assistant will then arrange for a pre-screening interview to ensure inclusion criteria are met.
A research assistant will review informed consent and receive a signed informed consent during the pre-screening.
Participants who are accepted into the study will then be offered up to 12 sessions of ACT or receive an unstructured treatment as usual counseling condition delivered by graduate students in the UAB medical/clinical psychology program under the supervision of Dr. Borgogna. These sessions will be 45 minutes each and delivered in Dr. Borgogna's lab. During the first sessions a survey battery will be administered on a lab secure computer administered via Qualtrics. It will be re-administered at session six, and during the last session.
The survey will include a broad base of demographic, mental health, and minority stress measures.
Participants will be assigned a random number that will link their survey responses across sessions. Identifying information will not be gathered as part of data collection.
Interventions
- Behavioral Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
Up to 16 session of unstructured counseling therapy informed by Acceptance and Commitment Therapy tradition. - Behavioral Treatment as Usual (TAU)
Unstructured counseling
Primary outcome measures
- Depression [Time frame: 12 weeks]
- Anxiety [Time frame: 12 Weeks]
- Post Traumatic Stress [Time frame: 12 Weeks]
- Internalized Heterosexism [Time frame: 12 Weeks]
- Discrimination [Time frame: 12 Weeks]
- Alcohol Problems [Time frame: 16 Weeks]
Secondary outcome measures (3)
- Experiential Avoidance [Time frame: 16 Weeks]
- Affect [Time frame: 16 Weeks]
- Problematic Pornography Use [Time frame: 12 Weeks]
Eligibility criteria
Inclusion criteria
- Must identify as non-heterosexual
Exclusion criteria
Suicide attempt within the past 12 months.
Current eating disorder.
Narcotics use within the past 3 months
Non-suicidal self-injury within the past 6 months.
Current/History of psychosis
Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.
Healthy volunteers: Yes
Study design
- Allocation
- Randomized
- Model
- Parallel assignment
- Masking
- Single blind
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
Study locations
United States · 1 center
- University of Alabama at Birmingham — Birmingham
Identifiers
NCT: NCT06614868 · IRB-300013570 · NBLAB1