Acceptance and Commitment Training Delivered by a Singing Teacher for Music Performance Anxiety: A Single-Case, Multiple Baseline Design.

Authors

Dana Zenobi, David G Juncos

Published in

Journal of voice : official journal of the Voice Foundation. Nov 12, 2026. Epub Nov 12, 2026.

Abstract

Acceptance and Commitment Training (ACT) has recently been utilized as a non-clinical intervention by university singing teachers to aid them in directly managing students' music performance anxiety (MPA), rather than referring students for psychotherapeutic treatment of MPA. Evidence obtained across multiple studies with different practitioners suggests singing teachers are able to achieve similar results as a clinical psychologist. Yet, the methodology in these studies has been limited by a lack of control in the research designs. In this study, a single subject, multiple-baseline design was introduced as a way to improve internal validity in these types of studies. Participants (N = 9) were undergraduate voice students with high levels of music performance anxiety (MPA), and they received 6hours of an ACT intervention delivered in 2-hour intervals, with either a 2-week baseline (N = 6) or a 6-week baseline (N = 3). The ACT interventions were administered by a voice professor under the supervision of a clinical psychologist. Students completed the same self-report measures as in previous studies to track changes in ACT-based processes, as well as reduction in levels of MPA and shame. Six expert adjudicators assessed the quality of students' video-recorded performances pre- and post-intervention. The results showed a significant decrease in MPA symptoms, along with an increase in students' acceptance of, and defusion from, anxiety-related thoughts and feelings, and an increase in their overall psychological flexibility. There was also causal evidence for increased acceptance of MPA symptoms. There was a significant improvement in students' adjudicated performance ratings post-intervention. Students provided self-reflections after each session about their experience with the ACT workshop. These findings are consistent with those obtained by a clinical psychologist, and by other singing teachers trained by a clinical psychologist, and they provide further empirical support for non-clinical, teacher-led interventions based in ACT to address MPA in university settings.

PMID:
43020748
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 13 Nov 2026.

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