The effectiveness of a therapeutically applied Dungeons and Dragons group intervention in a community mental health setting – Protocol for a randomised controlled trial.
Abstract
Objective The use of Therapeutically Applied Role-Playing Games (TA-RPGs) in mental health treatment settings has grown in popularity and early efficacy investigations appear promising. However, the use of TA-RPGs for the treatment of anxiety and depression has rarely been studied in people who present with comorbid complex mental health issues. While one recent waitlist-controlled trial has reported that a TA-RPG (Dungeons and Dragons with embedded CBT) reduced mental health symptomatology, this now needs to be replicated with a more robust experimental design. Publishing this protocol methodology before the study is completed aims to increase transparency and aid other researchers conducting similar research in this advancing field. Methods The authors propose a two-group randomised controlled trial testing the efficacy of a CBT-infused, therapeutically applied, 8-week Dungeons and Dragons group program. An active control group will play board games for a comparable amount of time. Participants will be consumers receiving care at a community mental health centre with complex care needs. Outcome measures for anxiety and depressive symptomatology will be collected before and after participation in both groups, with the intervention group also completing outcome measures at 12 months follow up. In this protocol paper the intervention will be outlined in detail. The trial is registered on the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry: ACTRN12625000296437.
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BibTeX
@misc{rae2026effectiveness,
title = {{The effectiveness of a therapeutically applied Dungeons and Dragons group intervention in a community mental health setting – Protocol for a randomised controlled trial.}},
author = {Terry Rae and Matthew Modini and Poppy Watson},
howpublished = {PsyArXiv},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.31234/osf.io/dvk45_v4},
url = {https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/dvk45_v4/},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - The effectiveness of a therapeutically applied Dungeons and Dragons group intervention in a community mental health setting – Protocol for a randomised controlled trial.
AU - Terry Rae
AU - Matthew Modini
AU - Poppy Watson
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/02
PB - PsyArXiv
DO - 10.31234/osf.io/dvk45_v4
UR - https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/dvk45_v4/
AB - Objective The use of Therapeutically Applied Role-Playing Games (TA-RPGs) in mental health treatment settings has grown in popularity and early efficacy investigations appear promising. However, the use of TA-RPGs for the treatment of anxiety and depression has rarely been studied in people who present with comorbid complex mental health issues. While one recent waitlist-controlled trial has reported that a TA-RPG (Dungeons and Dragons with embedded CBT) reduced mental health symptomatology, this now needs to be replicated with a more robust experimental design. Publishing this protocol methodology before the study is completed aims to increase transparency and aid other researchers conducting similar research in this advancing field. Methods The authors propose a two-group randomised controlled trial testing the efficacy of a CBT-infused, therapeutically applied, 8-week Dungeons and Dragons group program. An active control group will play board games for a comparable amount of time. Participants will be consumers receiving care at a community mental health centre with complex care needs. Outcome measures for anxiety and depressive symptomatology will be collected before and after participation in both groups, with the intervention group also completing outcome measures at 12 months follow up. In this protocol paper the intervention will be outlined in detail. The trial is registered on the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry: ACTRN12625000296437.
ER -