Abstract

The main goal of this study was to implement and assess the potential changes following the Destress for Success program in adolescents with high-risk of psychosocial disorders living in residential care. This program aims at providing adolescents with innovative ways to deal with stress. We have previously validated this program in a community sample and showed that it was mostly beneficial to adolescents starting high school with high levels of anger. In the current study, we measured the following outcome variables in 29 adolescents: levels of the stress hormone cortisol in saliva samples, the ability to recognize facial expressions of emotion, depressive symptomatology, perceived stress and self-esteem. Whereas no change in saliva cortisol levels was found, we observed increased self-esteem, decreased perceived stress, decreased depressive symptoms, and changes in the ability to detect emotion following the program. Those encouraging results need to be replicated in a randomized controlled trial.