NCT07244198: CFT@TeenSAD

Here we Test Out an Online Compassion Focused Intervention for Adolescents With Social Anxiety Disorder and Analyze Its Effect on (Self)Compassion, Emotion Regulation and Social Anxiety Symptoms, as Well as Heart Rate Variability.

Completed NA Last updated 3 March 2026

What this trial tests

NA trial testing Compassion Focused Therapy in Social Anxiety Disorder in 49 participants. Completed in 31 December 2025.

Timeline

1 January 2022

Primary endpoint
30 June 2025

31 December 2025

Quick facts

Lead sponsor	University of Coimbra
Phase	NA
Status	Completed
Study type	INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation	randomized
Design	parallel
Masking	none
Primary purpose	treatment
Enrollment	49
Start date	1 January 2022
Primary completion	30 June 2025
Estimated completion	31 December 2025
Sites	1 location across Portugal

Drugs / interventions tested

• Compassion Focused Therapy

Conditions studied

• Social Anxiety Disorder — all drugs for Social Anxiety Disorder →

Sponsor

University of Coimbra

Who can join

Adults 14 to 18, any sex, with Social Anxiety Disorder. Patients with the condition only — healthy volunteers not accepted.

Sponsor's own description

Emotion regulation (ER) is a key competence developed mainly throughout adolescence. According to an evolutionary perspective, threat, drive, and soothing systems interact to achieve ER. Difficulties in ER are transdiagnostic features in different psychopathologies and have been hypothesized as resulting from an unbalance of these ER systems. Research findings support Heart Rate Variability (HRV) as a biomarker of ER in adolescents. Higher HRV associates with adaptive ER; lower HRV associates with difficulties in ER and with both Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) and Conduct Disorder (CD). This project aims to test for differences in HRV patterns linked to the triggering of different ER systems, contrasting healthy controls with clinical adolescent samples (SAD vs. CD). Compassion-focused interventions have been effective in reducing SAD symptom severity in adults; however, this approach was not tested in pediatric samples.

Here we test the efficacy of an online-delivered compassion focused intervention for teens with Social Anxiety Disorder and assess its effect on (self)compassion, fears of compassion, social safeness, emotion regulation and social anxiety symptoms, as well as Heart Rate Variability.

Publications & conference data

No peer-reviewed publications indexed yet for this trial. Completed trials usually publish results within 12-18 months.