Participate in Our Research
Feeling Stressed?
Take a quick 10 minute eligibility survey!
The goals of the Stress & Resilience Study are to understand how childhood experiences and current stress affect your physical and mental health and what can be done to increase resilience.
• If you are eligible for the free 12-week stress management program, you can earn up to $254 and receive a free smartwatch.
• If you are not eligible for the 12-week program, you can earn $50 and receive a free smartwatch.
• You will also receive some or all of the following personalized health reports* for free:
- Stress Report
- Daily Glucose (Blood Sugar) Report
- Microbiome (Gut Bacteria) Report
- Air Pollution Exposure Report
- Environmental Chemical (Urine) Report
*These reports are comprehensive and based on sophisticated research analyses, and will be provided once all participants have completed the study. The Microbiome Report may take additional time.
who should join?
We welcome you to join if you meet the following criteria:
Proficient in English
18 and over
Live in California
Has not had and/or been treated for any type of cancer in the past two years
No positive test result for HIV Type 1 or 2 antibodies
No heart attack or stroke within the past year
No chronic use of any medications associated with impaired immune responsiveness such as anti-inflammatory medicine and systemic steroids
**Whether you’re sure or unsure about your eligibility for the study, click the button below to find out!
All races and genders are welcomed to the study!
Have questions?
Email us at stressstudy@mednet.ucla.edu or submit the form below.
Frequently Asked Questions
Participant Eligibility and Recruitment
Please click on the pink “ENROLL HERE” button on this page to access the eligibility screening survey. Once you complete the survey and are deemed eligible, one of our team members will reach out to you either by phone or email with enrollment and consenting information.
If they meet the eligibility criteria, they can enroll on this page.
Please do not provide the friend/spouse/family member’s contact details to us. For privacy reasons, we cannot reach out to them directly. Please ask them to visit this webpage to find out if they are eligible.
How to Participate & What to Do During The Study
You are invited to participate in the Stress & Resilience study which aims to understand how childhood experiences and current stress affect your physical and mental health and what can be done to increase resilience. Together, with your participation, we can work to improve the lives of all Californians!
- You will be asked to fill out surveys that will ask about life experiences, including some that might have been stressful. The surveys will also ask about your current health status and your daily health behaviors, like your sleep and eating habits.
- Then, you will be shipped some study materials in the mail, including a smartwatch. You will be asked to wear the smartwatch for at least 3 weeks to track your sleep, physical activity (calories, steps, skin temperature), and cardiovascular activity, like your heart rate and blood pressure. We require that you wear the smartwatch for a minimum of 18 hours for 5 out of 7 days even when you sleep. As a thank you for completing the whole study, you will be gifted the smartwatch as yours to keep!
- In addition to the smartwatch, you will be shipped other devices/kits in the same mail. The first device will attach to your upper arm with adhesive and help you take a small blood sample yourself by pressing a button. You will only place this device on your arm a few times, for 1-2 minutes each time. The second kit will ask you to collect saliva– all you have to do is spit in a tube! The third kit is to collect a small sample of your stool, or a small piece of feces. This is completely optional and, like all parts of the study, you can decline to participate. If you are interested in the stool collection kit, in return for your participation, you will be provided with a report of your microbiome analysis if you ask, which can help you understand how your eating may be affecting your health.
No. The entire study can be done in the comfort of your own home or in a private setting of your choice. We will ship any devices and kits to you. Everything that you will need to mail back will come with a pre-labeled box and we will pay for the postage. Any contact with the research team will be through the phone, email, or a secure video conferencing platform like Zoom.
No. Information about you and your health is personal and private, it cannot be used in this research study without your signed authorization. Your information will only be used in accordance with this authorization form and the consent form and as required by law.
We will provide you with a free smartwatch for the duration of the study. As a thank you for completing the whole study, you will be gifted the smartwatch as yours to keep!
You will be asked to wear your smartwatch for a minimum of 3 weeks and complete a few surveys. If you want, you can continue to wear your smartwatch for a longer duration.
For the purpose of the study, we require that you wear the smartwatch for a minimum of 18 hours for 5 out of 7 days even when you sleep. Therefore, before you go to bed, your smartwatch should be charged. We highly suggest you charge the watch during your showers as the watch should be taken off during showers. Battery life can last up to 4-5 days so you do not have to charge every single day. Charging time takes 2-2.5 hours, so we recommend that after showers and dinner, you charge your smartwatch for a couple of hours and wear it before going to bed.
As much information as we can collect is valuable and appreciated, but we also understand that it might not be possible for you to wear the smartwatch all the time. However, if you think you will not be able to meet these requirements, please reconsider enrolling in the study.
Consent, Authorization & Data Privacy
We will collect data from the smartwatch, such as step count, body movement, electrical changes in the skin related to stress (galvanic skin response, GSR), skin temperature, the amount of oxygen in your blood, your blood pressure, the quality of your sleep.
In addition, we will ask you to report about your life experiences, including some that might have been stressful. The surveys will also ask about your current health status and your daily health behaviors, like your sleep and eating habits.
We will also collect other biological samples from you such as a small blood
Additionally, if you agree, we will ask your permission to collect medical record information from you.
The data will be secured by UCLA, UCSF, and Stanford University and only accessed by the study team.
Once your identifiers (such as name, date of birth, address, etc) are removed from the research data, the research data may be shared publicly. For example the research data may be put in a public database for other researchers to use.
The data will be collected directly from the smartwatch itself and stored on secure Stanford University servers. In the context of the MyPHD app, which has been data risk approved by Stanford University, we have established a secure computational and storage framework to minimize any risks to your privacy.
Aside from the research team, some other parties may need to have access to some study information. More details are provided in the consent form.
The following parties are authorized to use and/or disclose your health information in connection with this research study:
- The Principal Investigator Dr. George M Slavich
- UCLA, UCSF, and Stanford University Administrative Panel on Human Subjects in Medical Research and any other units as necessary
- Stress & Resilience Research Team
Contacts for Questions, Concerns & Complaints
You can contact the Office of the Human Research Protection Program (OHRPP), which helps protect research study participants. You can reach the OHRPP by calling 310-825-5344 from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, Monday to Friday or by emailing participants@research.ucla.edu.
If you have any questions, concerns or complaints about this research, its procedures, risks and benefits, please contact the study team at stressstudy@mednet.ucla.edu.
The MyPHD App
The study app was created by Dr. Snyder’s lab at Stanford University. It is used in this study to collect physiological data from a smartwatch. This app will also be used to fill out surveys, access a 12-week training program if applicable, and any other links required during the study. MyPHD app is here to make this at-home-study easily accessible for you!
This issue can be solved by un-installing and then re-installing the app. We are constantly working on improving the app.
Yes, the app is available for iOS and Android.
We will send instructions on how to securely download and use our study app. When the app is installed on your phone, we will be able to collect your wearables data. It is important that you install and use the app properly, as that is the only way for us to collect your wearable data remotely.
Click here to watch a video which goes through the instructions for downloading, installing and using the app. If after watching the tutorial video, you still have questions, please reach out to us at stressstudy@mednet.ucla.edu.
