A POSITIVE SELF-TALK TRAINING PROGRAM IS EFFICACIOUS TO REDUCE DEPRESSION AMONG NURSING STUDENTS

Depression among adolescents has become one of the most challenging mental health issues of the 21st century. Failure to cooperate with treatment strategies is a major impediment to success and facilitates depressive problems being carried into adulthood. A distorted cognitive perspective (of self, future potential, and/or current experiences) has been defined as a risk factor for depression at all ages. An effective strategy that has been developed to control such self behavior is positive self-talk, which relates to an individual’s thoughts or perceptions that they are responsible for. The Positive Self-Talk Training Program (PSTP) has been successfully applied to alliterate maladaptive perceptions or cognitive systems and to reduce symptoms of depression.

A quasi-experimental research study (pre-post tested) was conducted in the Boromarajajonani Nursing College, Trang. Forty-five depress nursing students were enrolled and randomly separated into two groups: experimental group (n=15) and control group (n=30). The groups were matched for sex, age, and level of depression (mild to moderate). The experimental group was trained in and rehearsed positive self-talk by using the followings instruments: 1) demographic data form; 2) Beck Depression Inventory IA (BDI-IA); 3) Positive Self-Talk Training Program on Depression among Adolescents; and, 4) Burnett Self-Talk Inventory (BSTI). The control group received treatment as usual. The self-talk intervention was measured over a 24 week period. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics, paired t-test and independent t-test.

The results indicated that the PSTP is significantly efficacious for reducing depression among nursing students (p<0.01) and it represents a feasible intervention approach. Specifically, we found that the depression post-test mean score of the experimental group was significantly lower than that of the control group. (p<0.01). An important limitation of the current study that should be considered when generalizing the findings is that all participants came from a single region (Southern Thailand). Future studies should be designed to include multiple centres in order to better demonstrate the efficacy of the intervention.