Experimental evaluation of a neurophysiological intervention designed to increase student resilience: a pilot study

Abstract

Social and emotional learning (SEL) interventions have shown promise for building resilience and protecting youth from adverse  outcomes. This study reports on an experimental pilot evaluation of the Smart Brain Wise Heart SEL intervention during the 2021–2022  school year. Smart Brain Wise Heart (SBWH) uses a neurophysiological approach among ninth-grade students to evaluate the  intervention’s impact on youth resiliency, self-compassion, peer violence exposure, internalising disorders, and hyperactivity. Results did  not indicate any significant universal changes in target outcomes. These null findings regarding universal impact may be explained by the  unprecedented difficulty of implementing a school-based intervention amid ongoing COVID-19 restrictions and administrative issues.  Despite these obstacles, students with lower academic achievement in the intervention condition scored significantly higher for  resilience and self-compassion and lower on depressive symptoms than their peers in the comparison condition, even when controlling  for baseline scores, sex, attachment (father, mother, peer), and exposure to adverse childhood experiences. Our findings suggest SBWH  programming may have important implications for the trajectories of students exhibiting lower academic achievement, at a minimum, by  significantly improving their emotional resilience, self-compassion, and depressive symptoms during a vital developmental stage.  More research is urgently needed under optimal conditions to assess the universal implementation of the program.