Assessing the effect of a brief information intervention on children's social behaviours in a refugee setting

Last registered on January 21, 2020

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Assessing the effect of a brief information intervention on children's social behaviours in a refugee setting
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0005326
Initial registration date
January 20, 2020

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
January 21, 2020, 1:56 PM EST

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2020-01-23
End date
2021-06-30
Secondary IDs
Abstract
School connectedness is commonly defined as an academic environment in which students believe that adults and peers in the school care about them as individuals. School connectedness is a known protective factor against risky health behaviours and adverse mental health outcomes and is a driver of students’ academic performance. School connectedness is also a key factor that influences students’ prosocial behaviours and the development of their social skills. Previous research conducted in schools in Nyarugusu refugee camp has revealed that teachers report high levels of empathy towards their students and interest in their ideas and perspectives; however, student do not appear to know or perceive such interest and attention. We will assess whether a brief messaging intervention aimed at fixing this gap in perceptions between students and teachers affects student's pro-social behaviours and attitudes.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Devries, Karen and Camilla Fabbri. 2020. "Assessing the effect of a brief information intervention on children's social behaviours in a refugee setting." AEA RCT Registry. January 21. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.5326-1.0
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
The experiment is embedded into an existing study. The intervention consists in a brief message individually delivered to students by enumerators during the administration of the endline survey of the Preventing Violence Against Children (PVAC) study. The content of the message will be the following "We interviewed a lot of teachers in your school and we found out that most of them really care about their students. Nearly all teachers told us that they are really interested in understanding your’ ideas, problems and opinions".
Intervention Start Date
2020-01-23
Intervention End Date
2020-02-29

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
The primary outcome will be a measure of student's pro-social behavious elicited through the following question "If I told you that a classmate of yours is feeling sad because they are alone and they are looking for a friend to play with after school hours, would you volunteer to spend time with him/her?"
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary outcomes will be pro-social behaviour measured through the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) prosocial subscale.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
All students particpating in the PVAC endline survey will be individually randomised in a 1:1 ratio to either:
a treatment group that will received the message inserted in the PVAC survey,
a control armgroup that will receive the survey without any additional message.

Randomisation will be stratified by school.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
randomisation done by computer
Randomization Unit
individual students
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
27 schools, but randomisation will be at the individual level
Sample size: planned number of observations
500 students
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
250 treatment, 250 control
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
National Institute for Medical Research Tanzania
IRB Approval Date
2019-12-02
IRB Approval Number
NIMR/HQ/R.8c/Vol I/760
IRB Name
London School of Hyigiene and Tropical Medicine
IRB Approval Date
2020-01-10
IRB Approval Number
16000 ‑ 3

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials