Intervention effects and mechanisms of online single session therapy on test anxiety in university students: A randomized controlled trial

This study aimed to develop an online Single-Session Therapy (SST) intervention program for test anxiety and explore the intervention effects and mechanisms underlying the effectiveness of this SST program for university students experiencing test anxiety, utilizing a randomized controlled trial. Sixteen psychological counselors and 57 university students with test anxiety were recruited through online platforms. The student participants were randomly assigned to either the online SST intervention group or the control group. Both groups completed scale assessments on the day before the intervention, the day of the intervention, and on days 4, 7, and 10 after the intervention. Online SST effectively alleviated college students' test anxiety. In addition, SST also increased students' self-compassion levels, and self-compassion mediated the relationship between SST and test anxiety; meanwhile, counseling style preference matching significantly increased students' self-compassion levels, but did not positively affect their test anxiety levels. The online SST intervention targeting test anxiety effectively improves self-compassion and reduces test anxiety among university students. However, further research is needed to compare the advantages of SST with conventional counseling programs and to explore the mechanisms underlying counseling style preference matching. • A randomized controlled trial (RCT) was conducted to evaluate the intervention's effectiveness and underlying mechanisms. • Online-SST effectively alleviated college students' test anxiety and increased self-compassion levels. • Self-compassion mediated the relationship between SST and test anxiety. • Counseling style preference matching effectively increased self-compassion but did not positively impact test anxiety levels. • Findings highlight the potential of SST as a brief, effective intervention for test anxiety, warranting further research comparing it with conventional counseling approaches.