This study aims to develop and evaluate a virtual companion agent for providing psychological support to adolescents who have recently experienced stressful life events. This is a single-arm, pre-post pilot trial. We plan to recruit 55 adolescents aged 14-25 to receive a 4-week intervention via the virtual agent. The intervention primarily consists of multi-turn conversations focused on helping adolescents cope with stressful events, identify emotions, enhance social support, and adopt positive coping strategies. The primary objectives are to evaluate the effectiveness of the virtual agent in improving psychological symptoms, resilience, emotional intelligence, and perceived stress, and to comprehensively assess its feasibility, acceptability, and safety.

Over the past decade, mental health issues among adolescents have become increasingly prevalent. Approximately 14% of adolescents globally suffer from conditions like depression and anxiety. Adolescence is a critical developmental period, and mental health problems during this stage can have long-term negative impacts on relationships, academic performance, and future careers. However, due to factors such as cost, accessibility, and social stigma, many adolescents struggle to access timely and effective professional psychological services. In recent years, AI-based conversational agents have emerged as a potential solution. For some sensitive adolescents who are reluctant to confide in others or resistant to professional counseling, an anonymous, non-judgmental virtual conversational partner may serve as a lower-threshold avenue for them to open up and seek emotional support. Against this backdrop, this study aims to develop and evaluate a virtual companion agent specifically designed for adolescents. A total of 55 eligible adolescent participants will be enrolled. Participants will engage in a series of structured conversational interactions with the agent over 4 weeks and undergo multiple psychological assessments before, during, and after the intervention.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Aged between 14 and 25 years. Self-report of experiencing a stressful life event of moderate or greater severity within the past 6 months.

Total score on the relevant stress subscale of the Brief Symptom Inventory-53 (BSI-53) used for screening is < 63.

Able to understand and provide informed consent (for minor participants, informed assent from the participant and informed consent from a parent or guardian are required).

Exclusion Criteria:

• Current or previous diagnosis of a severe mental disorder (e.g., major depressive disorder, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder).

Having received more than 4 sessions of continuous professional psychotherapy or psychotropic medication treatment within the past 12 months.

Presence of severe suicidal or self-injurious behavior that is not effectively controlled and requires immediate clinical intervention.

Upon reasonable request and after approval of a research proposal, de-identified individual participant data that underlie the results of this study (specifically, the pre- and post-intervention scale scores) will be made available. This does not include any raw transcript data from conversations with the virtual agent, to protect participant privacy.

After the publication of the study

The researchers can access the data by contacting the PI at xiaw23@mail.sysu.edu.cn with the research purpose described.