Effects of Darkness Retreat: a Pilot Study

The primary goal of this pilot study is to test the feasibility and safety of a research protocol for a voluntary darkness retreat. The study will also allow for a preliminary examination of the psychological effects of the retreat. The investigators will investigate whether participants experience changes in their well-being and ruminative style, whether these changes persist over time, and if these effects are moderated by individual characteristics such as readiness for change or subjective evaluation of the experience as well as frequency of participants' monitoring. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of two experimental groups, both of which will spend 3 days and 3 nights in seclusion. These groups will differ only in the frequency of psychological monitoring during the retreat, allowing us to compare the effectiveness and safety of each protocol.

The aim of the pilot study is to test a research protocol designed to assess the psychological effects of several days of voluntary darkness retreat. The primary objective of the pilot is to examine whether the protocol is feasible, implementable, and safe under real-world conditions when working with a non-clinical population. Our sample will consist of 30 psychologically healthy students aged 30-50 with higher levels of trait anxiety and worry. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of the two conditions: (1) Low-frequency monitoring: one structured psychological consultation per day (one full psychological consultation per day) (2) High-frequency monitoring: three consultations per day (one full consultation + two shorter check-ins). The trial will also provide preliminary data on whether participating in a darkness retreat is associated with any changes in well-being and ruminative thought style. The investigators will examine if changes are observed in the levels of anxiety, ruminative style, worry, mindfulness, and a sense of meaning in life, if those changes differentiate accordingly to the monitoring frequency (high monitoring vs. low monitoring), and if those changes persist over time (at the 6-month follow-up). The study uses a 2 × 3 mixed factorial design with two intervention arms (low-frequency vs. high-frequency monitoring) and three measurement time points: T1 - just prior to the intervention, T2 - immediately after the intervention, and T3 - six-month follow-up. The primary intervention lasts three days and three nights. All primary and secondary outcomes are assessed using self-administered online questionnaires in Polish. Each primary outcome measure will be analyzed using 2 (arms) × 3 (time points) ANOVA models to test for the short- and long-term intervention effects. Additional analyses will use standard NHST procedures (e.g., t-tests and correlation coefficients) with a conventional significance level of α = .05. During the study, participants will not be informed that its primary aim is to compare two variants of the psychological monitoring protocol. This information will be withheld to minimize the risk of expectancy effects. To ensure the highest ethical standards, a debriefing procedure will be carried out after the study has been completed.