Can written disclosure reduce psychological distress and increase objectively measured injury mobility of student-athletes? A randomized controlled trial

Abstract

Injured students-athletes took part in a randomized controlled trial to test whether written disclosure could reduce psychological distress and improve injury mobility. Writing took place alongside prescribed physical rehabilitation and consisted of three 20-minute writing sessions, once a week for three consecutive weeks. Participants in the experimental injury-writing groupfollowed a structured form of written disclosure, called the guided disclosure protocol (GDP). They firstly, wrote about the onset of their injury in a chronological manner, secondly, they explicitly labelled their emotions and described the impact of the injury, finally they wrote about future coping and psychological growth. Controlswrote about nonemotional and noninjury related topics. In addition to self-report measures, a physiotherapist, blind to experimental condition, assessed mobility at the injury site. Although self-report indices remained unchanged, the GDP group evidenced a significant improvement in injury mobility compared to controls.