We compared the effects of a universal school-based preventive intervention for
child anxiety at two developmental stages. Six hundred and ninety-two
participants enrolled in either grade 6 (
n
= 293), children aged between 9 and 10 years, or grade 9 (
n
= 399), children aged between 14 and 16 years, were allocated to either a
school-based cognitive-behavioural intervention or to a monitoring group.
Participants completed the Spence Child Anxiety Scale and the Child Depression
Inventory and were stratified into low-, moderate-And high-risk groups based on
their anxiety scores at the start of the study. The effects of the prevention
programme were evaluated at post- and 12-month follow-up intervals. Post-study
results indicated significant reductions in anxiety (
p
< .001) and depression (
p
< .05) across high- and moderate-risk groups in both the intervention and
monitoring conditions. This trend was evident at 12-month follow-up, however,
reductions in anxiety were greater in the intervention condition (
p
< .05). At post assessment, grade 6 participants showed significant
changes in anxiety compared with grade 9 participants (
p
< .001), although both primary and secondary school participants showed
equal reductions in anxiety at 12-month follow-up. Overall, findings suggest
that universal intervention is potentially successful in reducing anxiety
symptoms in children. Primary school children reported the greatest changes in
anxiety symptoms, suggesting that earlier preventive intervention is potentially
more advantageous than later intervention in adolescence. The implications and
limitations of this study and directions for future research are discussed.