ACBS World Conference 2020 - Alison Stapleton, University College Dublin

"As a self-funded PhD student with a passion for knowledge transfer and exchange, receiving the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship gave me space to fully engage in the ACBS World Conference. Rather than having to divide my time between conference participation and my fulltime job, the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship allowed me to focus fully and connect with the values underlying my participation in ACBSWC18, namely dissemination, collaboration, and fun. Thanks to the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship I was able to present two posters, an IGNITE, an oral presentation, AND my first ever Folly! I have benefitted immensely from the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship both personally and professionally, having formed new connections with labs around the world and also received insightful feedback on my current research. The ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship took my ACBSWC18 experience to the next level, allowing me to immerse myself fully without needing to worry financially.

ACBS is dedicated to supporting all its members and I can honestly say that the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship gave me the springboard I needed as an early career self-funded researcher." 

2021 Grant Recipient:

Maria Hamdani, University of Akron (USA) and her colleagues (Dr. Vickie Coleman Gallagher, Dr. Grace H. C. Huang and Dr. Kelly Yu-Hsin Liao) are proud to be the recipients of the first ACBS Foundation Grant for their research on Psychological Flexibility and Adaptive Job and Family Behaviors of Resettled Syrian and Ukranian Refugees in USA.

"Unlike past studies of refugee experiences, our study examines the role of psychological flexibility in transition issues at the advanced stages of refugee work and family life in their new country. This grant will extend our ongoing research to support refugee wellness, self-determination, employment success, and their family's overall health and wellbeing. As researchers across the College of Business Administration, College of Education, and Department of Psychology, the Foundation Grant will strengthen our collaboration between the two universities and the local resettlement agencies, to build a holistic view of the refugee crisis, support the community, and attract additional funding resources for future research,"---Dr. Hamdani

Award Recipients for the ACBS Virtual World Conference 2021: Jin Xiaohuan, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, China and Pinelopi Konstantinou, University of Cyprus, Cyprus

The goal of the ACBS Foundation is to support existing activities within ACBS and explore areas for future development. One step in moving towards this goal has been to create the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship, which provides two outstanding students complimentary registration to attend the ACBS World Conference.

Jin Xiaohuan, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, China 

"As a PhD student from China which is classified as upper-middle-income economies, I am very grateful to receive ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship. The scholarship is not only as financial support to fund my registration fee to fully engage in the ACBS World Conference, but also as spiritual support to encourage me to keep my passion in CBS research and clinical practice.

The ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship gave me an opportunity to fully focus on ACBS Virtual conference 2021, in which I have learned a lot regarding the theories, techniques, delivery methods and effective tools of ACT in a series of settings for a series of different populations. I have met so many excellent experts in ACT, RFT and CBS. With this opportunity, I was able to present an oral presentation related to ACT with parents of children with health conditions and communicate with other scholars in this field.

The ACBS Virtual conference 2021 funded by the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship benefitted me a lot, taking my knowledge, skills, and insight of ACT to a new level, which will continue to help my research program. It also provided a platform to meet so many expert scholars from all over the world."

Pinelopi Konstantinou, University of Cyprus, Cyprus 

It was my honour to be awarded for the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship to attend the ACBS World Conference 2021. The ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship helped me to fully engage in the ACBS conference and thus expand my knowledge on ACT and improve both as a clinical psychologist and a researcher. I have benefitted immensely from the ACBS Foundation Scholarship as I was able to present a poster on providing recommendations to other professionals who are interested in conducting digital-based research. I received useful feedback and insight on my research, and I had the opportunity to build my professional network by connecting with experienced clinicians and researchers in ACT.

Thanks to the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship I was able to attend to a wide variety of symposiums, workshops and panels, and I left fully inspired with many new ideas for future studies in health and clinical psychology. As an early-career and self-funded researcher, the ACBS Foundation Scholarship helped me to expand my knowledge and improve my clinical and research skills, and I am confident that the ACBS community can keep me motivated throughout my career.
 

2022 Grant Recipient:

Wenqian ZHAO, PhD Candidate of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (Hong Kong SAR, China) and her supervisors (Prof. Wai Tong CHIEN and Prof. Yuen Yu CHONG) are proud to be the recipients of the 2022 ACBS Foundation Grant for Miss ZHAO’s PhD research on Effectiveness of online ACT-based program for breast cancer survivors on improving body image disturbance.

"We combined the nursing techniques (i.e., health education) with ACT techniques in our intervention to examine the effectiveness of ACT-based intervention on improving body image disturbance of breast cancer survivors. This grant will support our ongoing research to help breast cancer survivors on improving their perceived body image, emotional problems and dysfunctions during the treatment and/or rehabilitation. As a video-conferencing program, the Foundation Grant will strengthen feasibility and acceptability of the intervention (especially the internet utilization) during the whole research, to establish an accessible, sustainable online platform for telemedicine nursing service; promote the physical, psychological and social rehabilitation of breast cancer survivors; and attract more attention and funding resources for future research on those patients and also other populations with the similar body image concerns."

Grant Report - October 2023

Objectives:

This study aimed to assess the immediate (T1) and three-month (T2) post-intervention effectiveness of a video-conferencing Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)-based group intervention program, conducted in real-time, on improving body image disturbance among breast cancer survivors. The intervention program was compared to a control group receiving breast cancer education only. The specific objectives of the study were to evaluate the effectiveness of the video-conferencing ACT-based group intervention program on the following outcomes at T1 and T2:

• Perceived body image, including measures of body dissatisfaction and body appreciation.
• Psychological flexibility, which refers to the ability to adaptively respond to internal experiences and engage in values-based actions.
• Body image-related emotions, encompassing depressive and anxiety symptoms.
• Body image-related dysfunctions, including sexual function and overall quality of life.

Outputs and Deliverables:

With the support of this grant, Dr. ZHAO completed the main RCT in her Ph.D. programme in Feb 2023. A PhD thesis containing the findings in this RCT was completed and submitted to the Chinese University of Hong Kong in July 2023. 

The results showed no significant interaction effects in overall and all dimensions of body dissatisfaction, body appreciation, depressive and anxiety symptoms, and psychological flexibility in both the ITT and PP analyses. Only a significant interaction effect was found in the orgasm dimension of sexual function in PP analysis at three-month post-intervention and the general social well-being dimension of quality of life in ITT analysis at immediate post-intervention when compared with the control group. These non-significant results were likely to be explained by 1) the lack of involvement of their significant person (e.g., partner) that had impacts on the participants' body image, 2) the additional psychological burdens caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, 3) stigma and avoiding attitudes to mental problems in Chinese culture; and 4). weakness in group counselling skills of the interventionist. 
We are preparing a manuscript of this RCT for publication to an international peer-reviewed journal. The abstract of this manuscript is going to be submitted to the coming 2024 ACBS world conference.

Impact and benefits to the researchers, CBS, and society at large?

This project demonstrates the advantages of multidisciplinary cooperation. The experts engaged in the intervention development of this project include psychotherapists, oncologists, and nurses. Their valuable advice and participation provided different angles to observe the same question, increasing the feasibility and acceptability of our intervention protocol. 

In this project, students participated and were encouraged to apply CBS to more fields. For example, two research assistants (undergraduate students) expressed great interest in CBS and would like to design a CBS-based programme as  their master's projects in hypertension and diabetes patients:  "Psychological flexibility may help patients maintain health-promoting behaviours with less stress and worries. "

Clinical nurses who participated in our program were also encouraged to receive related CBS training, for example, mindfulness therapy and use these strategies in their daily work: "I have been trying to help patients ease their pre-surgery anxiety through conversations, but it doesn't seem to work. Maybe I can try taking them with me to do mindful breathing and meditation exercises in the future. "

In addition to patients, their families also received help from our health booklets and expressed willingness to do CBS exercises together: "I read the booklets you gave my mother and I feel like some of the exercises are perfect for us to do together. This can help me understand more about her inner thoughts and feelings. I thought I could do something for her too. "

For the development and extension of CBS, this project provides evidence and support for nurses on the feasibility of applying CBS-based approaches in their areas, such as oncology nursing care. Supervised by the supervisors and ACT trainer, the self-rating ACT Core Competency score of Dr. ZHAO (i.e., registered nurse) ranged from 4.0 (i.e., Distinguishing the Conceptualized Self from Self-as-context) to 6.5 (i.e., Defining Valued Directions).  This demonstrated a medium level of intervention competency of a nurse in implementing a group ACT-based intervention, which was feasible to reach significant intervention results but needed further improvement in more practices. We also recommended involving psychotherapy and psychoeducation in the oncology nursing speciality training to provide mental health care and support.

For society at large, this project attracted more attention from not only the patients themselves, but also the medical workers, families, and even society such as workplaces to breast cancer patients' body image problems. On the one hand, breast cancer patients pay more active attention to and improve their mental health and can achieve comprehensive physical and psychological recovery better and faster. On the other hand, this can help promote related research and policies, such as how to solve the re-employment difficulties and social discrimination faced by breast cancer patients due to physical disabilities after treatment. If these issues receive more attention and are well addressed, it will help reduce the burden of breast cancer faced by society as a whole.
 

Award Recipients for the ACBS World Conference 2022: Zacharias Christensen, University of Copenhagen, Denmark and Jiayin Ruan, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China

The goal of the ACBS Foundation is to support existing activities within ACBS and explore areas for future development. One step in moving towards this goal has been to create the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship, which provides two outstanding students complimentary registration to attend the ACBS World Conference.                                                                                   

Zacharias Christensen, University of Copenhagen, Denmark      

2023 Grant Recipient:

Dafne Morroni, Clinical Psychology PhD Candidate of the University of Cyprus (Nicosia, Cyprus) and her supervisor (Dr. Maria Karekla) are proud to be the recipients of the 2023 ACBS Foundation Grant for Miss Morroni’s PhD research on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy with Unaccompanied Minors.  

For this project, the Self-Help Plus (SH+) protocol (World Health Organization, 2021) which has been successfully implemented in adult refugees, was adapted for adolescents from 13- 18 years old. A four-week ACT group intervention is currently being carried out with unaccompanied minors in shelters in major cities across the country. It is anticipated that the ACT group intervention will improve the minors’ psychological wellbeing, augment prosocial behaviour, and enhance quality of life. The Foundation Grant will be funding translation and printing of therapy materials as well as interpreters for the intervention. The Foundation Grant will aid in establishing feasibility and acceptability of ACT in unaccompanied minors. We hope that the support of the Foundation Grant will lead to increased interest and funding resources for future research with this underserved and vulnerable population.

Grant Report - May 2024

Unaccompanied minors (UM) are a highly vulnerable refugee subgroup as they face several challenges at a critical point in their physical and psychosocial development without the support of a parent or caregiver. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is effective for the treatment of trauma survivors and for vulnerable refugee groups. Although ACT is theoretically pertinent to the refugee population, the empirical evidence is still in its infancy.

The present project investigated whether ACT would be beneficial to UM in shelters in Cyprus. Prior to commencing the project, a systematic review and qualitative research synthesis examined the evidence of effectiveness and acceptability of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and third-wave approaches (i.e., ACT) in improving the quality of life and psychological symptoms of UM. Third wave studies showed preliminary evidence for improvements in psychological flexibility and mindfulness in UM, as well as improvements in psychological symptoms. The qualitative synthesis demonstrated that CBT and third wave interventions are acceptable, create safety and cultivate a sense of togetherness in UM.  

Based on the findings from the systematic review, a cluster randomized controlled trial was carried out in six shelters across Cyprus. 101 UM participated in the trial (49 males, 52 females), aged between 13 and 18 years old (M age=15.97, SD=1.23). Shelters were randomly assigned to either a four-session ACT-based treatment group or wait-list control group. Participants completed self-report measures at pre-intervention, post-intervention, 1-month, and 3-months follow-up. Self-report measures assessed quality of life, psychological flexibility, psychological symptoms. Statistically significant improvements were observed for psychological flexibility at post-intervention and 1-month follow-up in the treatment group. Statistically significant improvements were also observed for stress, anxiety, and depression in both the treatment and control groups. Gender differences were also observed in this study. Specifically, female UM seemed to drive the changes observed in the treatment group for psychological flexibility, indicating initial evidence of gender differences in this population.

Award Recipients for the ACBS World Conference 2023: Yass Radd, City University of London and Xu Wang, Chinese University of Hong Kong.

The goal of the ACBS Foundation is to support existing activities within ACBS and explore areas for future development. One step in moving towards this goal has been to create the ACBS Foundation Student Scholarship, which provides two outstanding students complimentary registration to attend the ACBS World Conference.      

Xu Wang, Chinese University of Hong Kong

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to ACBS for awarding me the 2023 ACBS World Conference student scholarship. This financial assistance not only enabled me to attend the conference but also exemplified ACBS's commitment to supporting young researchers and students in their pursuit of knowledge and professional development. During the conference, I had the privilege of delivering an oral presentation on a systematic review of compassion-based interventions for parents of children and adolescents with chronic health conditions. This experience allowed me to contribute to the field and share my findings with fellow researchers and practitioners.

The 2023 ACBS World Conference encompassed a diverse range of symposiums, workshops, and panels. I had the invaluable opportunity to learn about theories and techniques about compassion from the founders of compassion-focused therapy, as well as gain insights from clinical experts and scholars on the application of compassion-based interventions in various populations. Additionally, I acquired knowledge and skills related to acceptance and commitment therapy, which will undoubtedly enhance my future research and clinical practice. The chance to connect with experts in the field and learn from their experiences was truly transformative.

Participating in the 2023 ACBS World Conference was an enriching experience that expanded my knowledge and deepened my appreciation for contextual behavioral science. The opportunity to present my research, engage in meaningful discussions, and learn from esteemed professionals in the field has been truly invaluable. I look forward to applying the knowledge and skills gained from this conference to further my research and make a positive impact on the lives of parents and children affected by chronic health conditions.

 Yass Radd, City University of London

Attending and presenting at the ACBS 2023 World Conference in Cyprus was a truly great experience. Being a year into my part-time PhD at the time, it is sometimes difficult to feel fully immersed in the research and literature. My attendance at the conference gave me the chance to get up to date with the current research being carried out as well as consider the future of contextual behaviour science.

Getting involved by presenting my own research as part of a symposium was very rewarding and the new connections and friends I made were invaluable. I left feeling refreshed, inspired, and ready to continue research into ACT interventions. I am grateful of the support and opportunity to have attended my first ACBS conference and hope to attend many more in the future.

2024 Grant Recipient:

Sini LI, PhD Candidate of the The Chinese University of Hong Kong, and her co-investigators; Dr. Waitong Chien and Dr. Kamki LAM (The Chinese University of Hong Kong) are proud to be the recipients of the 2024 ACBS Foundation Grant for Sini LI's randomized controlled trial of an ACT-based parenting program for parents and autistic children..

Parents of children with a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often experience significant stress and emotional difficulties due to the demands of caregiving and the complex nature of their children's condition. This research proposal aims to evaluate the effectiveness of an acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT)-based parenting program in improving parental stress, depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, psychological flexibility, self-efficacy, as well as children’s emotional and behavioral problems, when compared with the usual-care-only. By helping parents develop acceptance, psychological flexibility, and strategies to break free from unhelpful patterns of thinking and behavior, this program can empower them to effectively manage their psychological experiences and flexibly respond to their children’s needs and conditions.

The study will be conducted as a randomized controlled trial, with participants randomly assigned in 1:1 ratio to either the intervention group or the control group. Participants in control group will receive routine services from their children’s special education school as usual-care. Participants in the intervention group, in addition to usual-care, will receive a group-based, blended format (using both face-to-face and online modalities), and eight-weekly-session ACT-based parenting program and a workbook to facilitate recap and home practice. The data will be collected after recruitment (T0), immediate post-intervention (T1), and three-month post-intervention (T2).

This trial fills a crucial evidence gap by evaluating a new intervention program for parents of autistic children, addressing their diverse informational, emotional, and relational needs within the care pathway. By providing targeted and holistic support, parents, autistic children, and family members can benefit in the short and long term. This study would be the first to examine the effectiveness of an ACT-based parental training program for Chinese parents of autistic children. If this program is shown to be helpful, it will fill an important evidence gap in existing care pathways in China and worldwide.