Treating social cognition impairment with the online therapy ’SoCoBo’: A randomized controlled trial including traumatic brain injury patients

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Treating social cognition impairment with the online therapy ’SoCoBo’: A randomized controlled trial including traumatic brain injury patients

• Tobias Lohaus ,
• Sally Reckelkamm ,
• Patrizia Thoma

• Tobias Lohaus, 
• Sally Reckelkamm, 
• Patrizia Thoma

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• Published: January 10, 2024
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0294767
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Abstract

Objective

Acquired brain injuries (ABIs), such as traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), often entail impairments of general cognition (e.g., memory, attention or executive functions) and social cognition (e.g. emotion recognition, theory of mind [ToM], social problem-solving). The availability of fully computerized interventions targeting sociocognitive deficits specifically in neurologically impaired patients is extremely limited. Therefore, the Treatment Program for Deficits in Social Cognition and Social Competencies of the Ruhr University Bochum (SoCoBo), a fully computerized online therapy designed for ABI patients was evaluated in a randomized controlled trial involving TBI patients.

Method

Sixty-four patients with TBI were randomly assigned to two groups with 43 patients fully completing either SoCoBo (N = 27) or a commercially available computerized program for cognitive rehabilitation (RehaCom^®, N = 16). All participants underwent comprehensive pre-post online neuropsychological assessment and worked with their respective rehabilitation programs for four days a week during a scheduled period of 12 weeks.

Results

After treatment, the SoCoBo group, but not the RehaCom^® group showed significant improvements in facial emotion recognition and self-rated empathy. Moreover, in the SoCoBo group, an increase in empathy was also associated with increased life satisfaction after treatment. There were no improvements in ToM and social problem-solving. Furthermore, general cognition did not improve in any of the groups.

Conclusions

SoCoBo represents an effective new online therapy for the amelioration of deficits in key domains of social cognition. Its implementation in clinical practice will serve as a meaningful addition to the existing fully computerized approaches specifically in neurological patient groups.

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Citation: Lohaus T, Reckelkamm S, Thoma P (2024) Treating social cognition impairment with the online therapy ’SoCoBo’: A randomized controlled trial including traumatic brain injury patients. PLoS ONE 19(1): e0294767. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0294767

Editor: Mohammad Jamil Rababa, Jordan University of Science and Technology, JORDAN

Received: July 14, 2023; Accepted: November 1, 2023; Published: January 10, 2024

Copyright: © 2024 Lohaus et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: Data available on request due to privacy/ethical restrictions: The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author, TL, or from Heike Berzio (administration of the Neuropsychological Therapy Center of the Ruhr University Bochum where this study was conducted, heike.berzio@ruhr-uni-bochum.de). The data are not publicly available due to containing information that could compromise the privacy of research participants.

Funding: This work was supported by the German Social Accident Insurance (DGUV; https://www.dguv.de/en/index.jsp; grant FR296 received by author PT). The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.