Preliminary investigation of the feasibility of a long‐term but low‐frequency preventive intervention for depression in Japanese high schools

Aim We explored the feasibility of a long‐term but low‐frequency psychological preventive intervention in a high school setting. Background High school students may experience depression; psychological interventions to improve social and cognitive skills may be useful to decrease such depression. A long‐term but low‐frequency intervention may be feasible in this setting because of its minimal time demands and lack of need for specialist human resources Design We conducted a single‐arm longitudinal descriptive study with an intervention applied six times over 2 years in one high school. Method We conducted a psychological preventive intervention with 94 high school students in one school for 2 years (April 2014 to March 2016). This intervention aimed to improve social and cognitive skills. We measured social skills, cognitive distortion, and depression five times during the 2‐year period, through a self‐report scale. Results/Findings Scores for maintaining relationship skills tended to increase over the 2 years. However, depression did not decrease over the intervention period. Conclusion Although our research did not include control conditions and the intervention did not decrease depression, the six‐session programme for high school adolescents improved an aspect of social skills that is a preventive factor against depression. Summary statement What is already known about this topic? High school students may experience mental issues, but how to address this problem has been neglected. Psychological preventive programmes are effective to reduce depression in high school students. It is difficult to manage time and human resources to implement interventions. What this paper adds? The long‐term, low‐frequency programme was feasible in one high school. High school adolescents who completed the intervention demonstrated improved relationship maintenance skills. The programme did not decrease severity of depression. The implications of this paper: Our long‐term but low‐frequency intervention may be conducted by school nurses at lower cost than previous interventions and may improve an aspect of high school students' social skills.