R1: Increasing Social Networking Opportunities following TBI
Principal Investigator: Margaret A. Struchen,
Ph.D.
Co-Principal Investigator: Sunil Kothari, M.D.
Overview:
- This study is a randomized, wait-list controlled clinical trial of a peer mentoring program focused on increasing social interaction opportunities following TBI.
- Persons with TBI who have been successful in social integration after their injuries will be paired to those with TBI who are reporting not being happy with their level of social activity.
- Social activity levels will be compared between persons receiving peer mentoring to those of persons on the wait-list for participating in the peer mentoring.
- This study will be conducted along with the Transitional Learning Center in Galveston.
Loneliness is one of the major problems that people may experience after traumatic brain injury. Studies have shown that loss of pre-injury friendships and having fewer people in one's social circle are common problems for people with moderate to severe brain injury. Often, the family becomes the main source for social activities. Having relationships with others is of key importance to feeling like one is part of a community. Although relationships with others and participation in social activities are known to be very important, few studies have been done to look at ways to improve social integration after injury.
Peer mentoring has been used to help persons with disabilities with adjustment issues and with finding ways to access resources. Using peer mentoring to help with developing social relationships has been used in some groups. One study looked at using social mentoring to increase the number of social contacts for three individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI). The program was found to be useful for this small group. The current study attempts to use a social peer mentoring program for a larger number of individuals with TBI.
This project will test the usefulness of a social peer mentoring program to help improve social outcomes and decrease feelings of loneliness for persons with brain injury. Social peer mentors are people with TBI who have had a good social outcome and are interested in helping others with brain injury improve their own social outcomes.
Improving social outcomes involves:
- Increasing how often a person does social activities (including activities like going to dinner with friends, having people visit your home, talking on the telephone, or attending sports events, for example).
- Increasing the number of people that a person can do these social activities with.
A randomized clinical trial is one way of testing how well a given treatment or intervention works. For the social peer-mentoring project, what this means is that a person who wants to have a social peer mentor will have an equal chance of being assigned to have a mentor right away or will be assigned to a wait list. Those assigned to the wait list will be able to have a mentor after a four-month waiting period.
This study will compare how people do during and after working with a social peer mentor as compared to those who haven't had the chance to work with a mentor yet.
We will be comparing these two groups on several things, including:
- The number of times that they've participated in social activities
- The changes in numbers of people they interact with
- Symptoms of depression
- Feelings of loneliness
- Satisfaction with life
