Feasibility Study to Investigate the Use of a Stress Meter 'Stressometer' Four Times a Day for Two Weeks to Measure Perceived Stress and Correlation of the Results With Measures of Validated Psychometric Questionnaires Related to Anxiety, Stress, and Depression in a Population of Healthy University Students
Feasibility Study to Investigate the Use of a Stress Meter 'Stressometer' Four Times a Day for Two Weeks to Measure Perceived Stress and Correlation of the Results With Measures of Validated Psychometric Questionnaires Related to Anxiety, Stress, and Depression in a Population of Healthy University Students
The goal of this observational study is to learn the feasibility of using a mobile application "Stressometer" to measure perceived stresss levels several times per day. The study will also explore if the stress scores collected with the application are similar to results from standard questionnaires about stress, anxiety, and depression.
The main questions it aims to answer are:
Can participants regularly report their stress four times a day for two weeks using the mobile application? Do participants find the application easy and acceptable to use? Are stress scores collected with the application related to scores from validated questionnaires on stress, anxiety, and depression?
Participants will:
Use the Stressometer mobile application to rate their stress level four times per day for 14 days Complete questionnaires about stress, anxiety, and depression at the beginning and/or end of the study Provide feedback on how easy and acceptable the application is to use
Researchers will use this information to understand whether this mobile tool is practical for measuring stress in daily life and whether it provides results similar to established psychological questionnaires.
Stress is a dynamic psychological state that can fluctuate throughout the day. Traditional methods for assessing stress, such as validated psychometric questionnaires, typically rely on retrospective reporting and may not fully capture short-term variations in perceived stress. Mobile health technologies approaches offer the opportunity to measure stress in real time and in naturalistic settings.
The Stressometer is a mobile application developed to allow rapid and repeated self-assessment of perceived stress using a simple numeric scale. However, the feasibility of using such a tool multiple times per day over a sustained period, as well as its relationship with established psychometric measures, remains to be established.
In a preliminary study, feasibility was investigated in a sample of 30 healthy student participants. Participants were instructed to report their perceived stress level using the Stressometer application four times per day (morning, midday, evening, and bedtime) over a 14-day period. Compliance with repeated assessments and participant engagement were monitored throughout the study.
In addition to mobile-based stress assessments, participants completed validated psychometric questionnaires evaluating stress, anxiety, depression, and well-being. Mean stress scores obtained via the Stressometer were subsequently analyzed and correlated with questionnaire-derived scores to assess convergent validity.
This study aims to further evaluate the feasibility of intensive longitudinal stress measurement using a mobile application, focusing on compliance rates and user acceptability. It also seeks to examine the relationship between real-time stress ratings and standardized psychological measures, in order to determine whether the Stressometer provides a reliable and ecologically valid assessment of perceived stress in daily life.
Inclusion Criteria:
Participants must meet all of the following criteria to be eligible for inclusion in the study:
Exclusion Criteria:
Participants will be excluded if they meet any of the following criteria: