Skip to main content
ABCT 2025 59th Annual Convention Main banner
Psychology Tools Ad
Final Program


Icon Legend
This session is not in your schedule.
This session is in your schedule. Click again to remove it.
Presentation Icons
Recorded Session
Recorded Session
Ticketed Session
Ticketed Session
Evaluation ViewAttendees 1

Adult Depression
Session Type:: Symposia

Symposium 59 - COVID Crashed My Clinical Study!: Surprising Results, New Paths, and Lessons in Resilience

Sunday, November 23, 2025
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM CST
Location: Strand 10 A&B, Level 2
CE: 1.5

Keywords: Clinical Trial, Mood, Technology / Mobile Health
Level of Familiarity: Basic to Moderate
Recommended Readings: Rohan, K. J., Franzen, P. L., Roeckelin, K. A., Siegle, G. J., Kolko, D. J., Postolache, T. T., & Vacek, P. M. (2022). Elucidating treatment targets and mediators within a confirmatory efficacy trial: Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial of cognitive-behavioral therapy vs. light therapy for winter depression. Trials, 23, 383. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13063-022-06330-9,   King, A. P., Block, S. R., Sripada, R. K., Rauch, S. A., Porter, K. E., Favorite, T. K., Giardino, N., & Liberzon, I. (2016). A Pilot Study of Mindfulness-Based Exposure Therapy in OEF/OIF Combat Veterans with PTSD: Altered Medial Frontal Cortex and Amygdala Responses in Social-Emotional Processing. Frontiers in psychiatry, 7, 154. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2016.00154,   Liu, T., Meyerhoff, J., Mohr, D. C., Ungar, L. H., & Kording, K. P. (2020). COVID-19 pandemic: Every day feels like a weekday to most. medRxiv, 2020-05.,   Price, M., Legrand, A. C., Brier, Z. M., van Stolk-Cooke, K., Peck, K., Dodds, P. S., ... & Adams, Z. W. (2022). Doomscrolling during COVID-19: The negative association between daily social and traditional media consumption and mental health symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 14(8), 1338. https://doi.org/10.1037/tra0001202,  

Imagine this scenario: The NIH has funded your grant application…and then COVID-19 emerges as the first global pandemic in 100 years. The pandemic necessitated rapid adaptations in clinical trials and observational studies across multiple domains of mental health research. This symposium shares personal experiences from four large, multi-year NIH-funded studies underway when the pandemic began. This suite of studies models lessons in resilience, including two clinical trials that went from in-person to Zoom overnight and two studies that overhauled their scope because original methods were infeasible due to COVID restrictions. Study topics range from CBT efficacy for depression and PTSD treatment, personal sensing research, and media consumption effects on mental health.

First, Kelly Rohan presents a randomized clinical trial testing cognitive-behavioral therapy for seasonal affective disorder (CBT-SAD) against light therapy (LT), which revealed unexpected non-replication of prior findings. LT showed faster symptom relief and higher remission rates post-treatment, and the durability advantage previously observed for CBT-SAD was absent. Notably, cohorts treated with in-person CBT-SAD before COVID-19 had better outcomes compared to those treated remotely during the pandemic, suggesting telehealth limitations for CBT-SAD.

Second, Tony King presents a PTSD intervention trial that abruptly transitioned from in-person to remote delivery. Despite this shift, both mindfulness-based cognitive therapy and progressive muscle relaxation showed large and comparable improvements in symptoms, maintained high retention, and showed good client satisfaction. Results suggest that these remotely delivered group interventions are viable treatment modalities.

Third, Jonah Meyerhoff presents a large-scale personal digital sensing study of depression that had to pivot in scope when COVID limited variability in the original predictors. The study transitioned to examine well-being before vs. after the emergency declaration and social distancing. EMA findings indicated elevated stress and worsened mood, comparable in magnitude to weekend vs. weekday mood changes in the pre-pandemic period. Those who lost jobs early in the pandemic experienced significant depression symptom increases, underscoring the differential impact of pandemic-related disruptions.

Lastly, Matt Price describes a brain imaging study of young adults with histories of childhood maltreatment that was reformulated in response to COVID challenges. The resulting longitudinal EMA study used mobile technology to examine the mental health effects of media consumption during COVID-19. Social media exposure related to increased depression and PTSD symptoms, particularly among those with more severe maltreatment histories, while traditional media exposure showed no such association. Results highlight the psychological risks of excessive doomscrolling during crises among those with pre-existing vulnerabilities.

Collectively, these studies emphasize that clinical research requires creativity and resiliency in reacting to challenges, using flexible research methodologies, and grappling with unexpected findings.

Learning Objectives:

At the end of this session, the learner will be able to:
  1. Explain the impact of the pandemic on the comparative efficacy of CBT-SAD vs. light therapy for winter depression.
  2. Identify effect sizes of 2 group PTSD treatments (Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy and Progressive Muscle Relaxation) delivered remotely.
  3. Identify at least 2 key indicators of mental well-being that changed during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
  4. Determine the influence of social media versus traditional media messaging on mental health during the COVID 19 pandemic.

Presentations:

  • 12:06 PM - 12:27 PM CST
    (SYM 59) Re-evaluating Winter Depression Treatments: Unpacking the Unexpected Non-replication of CBT-SAD vs. Light Therapy Efficacy Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic

    Speaker: Kelly J. Rohan, Ph.D. (she/her/hers) – University of Vermont

    Co-author: Peter L. Franzen, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – University of Pittsburgh

    Co-author: Kathryn A. Roecklein, Ph.D. (she/her/hers) – University of Pittsburgh

    Co-author: Greg J. Siegle, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – University of Pittsburgh

    Co-author: Teodor T. Postolache, M.D. (he/him/his) – University of Maryland School of Medicine

    Co-author: Joan Skelly, M.S. (she/her/hers) – University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine

    Co-author: Pamela M. Vacek, Ph.D. (she/her/hers) – University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine

  • 12:27 PM - 12:48 PM CST
    (SYM 59) In-person to Zoom Overnight: High Levels of Adherence, Retention, and Efficacy in Remotely Delivered Mind-body Group Interventions for Posttraumatuic Stress Disorder in a Community Sample

    Speaker: Anthony P. King, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – The Ohio State University

    Co-author: Todd K. Favorite, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – University of Michigan Medical School

    Co-author: David M. Fresco, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – University of Michigan Medical School

  • 12:48 PM - 1:09 PM CST
    (SYM 59) Sensing Change: Pivoting a Large Scale Personal Sensing Study During the COVID-19 Pandemic

    Speaker: Jonah Meyerhoff, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine

    Co-author: Lyle Ungar, Ph.D. – Department of Computer Science, University of Pennsylvania

    Co-author: Konrad Kording, PhD – University of Pennsylvania

    Co-author: David C. Mohr, Ph.D. (he/him/his) – Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine

    Co-author: Tony Liu, PhD – Mount Holyoke

  • 1:09 PM - 1:30 PM CST
    (SYM 59) COVID19 Media Diets: Rapid Protocol Adaptation to Understand Influence of Social Media on covid-19 Information at the Start of the Pandemic

    Speaker: Matthew Price, Ph.D. – University of Vermont