Studies

Studies, run in six-week sprints.

Three cohorts, one measurement model, one growing dataset. Each study is a six-week sprint that ends on a paper, with a long arm running in parallel on the same people. The Institute delivers MABERT; the university partner owns the measurement.

01How We Run Studies

A study is a six-week sprint that ends on a date.

Each sprint is a fixed six-week window. A short intensive baseline is captured at intake, then five to six weeks of MABERT with continuous and weekly measurement. The sprint ends on its date with a locked dataset, whatever it shows, and that dataset becomes a paper.

The rule is simple and it is enforced at pre-registration: an outcome either completes in six weeks, or we state why it cannot and route it to the long arm. The long arm is not a separate study. It is the same cohort, measured again at three and six months, which is how durability and the slower markers are read.

One recruitment effort, more than one paper. The sprint reports the proximal result now; the long arm reports durability later, from the same people.

02What Moves in Six Weeks, and What Does Not

Every outcome declares its own timescale.

Pretending a slow marker moves fast would sink the credibility of the whole programme. So each outcome is labelled before the sprint begins.

Reported at six weeks

Self-report wellbeing, stress and mood
Emotion regulation
Heart-rate variability, cortisol slope and sleep
Movement on goals scoped to the sprint
Leader and friend-observed capacity change

Reported from the long arm, with the reason

Inflammatory markers such as hs-CRPLong biological latency and high noise.
Durability and relapse preventionA follow-up question by definition.
Resilience under a real setbackRequires a setback to actually occur.
Deep transformation and habit consolidationConsolidates over months.
Organisational and developmental outcomesMove over quarters, or on a developmental clock.

03Rigour Without Withholding

We do not withhold the work in the name of research.

There is no control arm, because no one is denied the programme. Confidence comes from five other places instead.

Everyone is their own control: A dense baseline before MABERT starts, then frequent measurement during and after. Each person’s own pre-start trajectory is the comparison, not a stranger who was withheld the work.
Staggered starts, not a withheld arm: People enrol in waves, so start dates differ. For children and students this is a multiple baseline; for the workplace it is a stepped-wedge. Everyone receives the full programme; the staggering separates it from time and season.
Convergence across five lenses: A biomarker, a friend, a leader and a goal record cannot all flatter in the same direction by accident. Agreement across channels is the evidence.
Dose-response and mechanism: More practice predicting more change is an internal gradient a placebo cannot explain. Early capacity change predicting later wellbeing is a causal fingerprint.
Pre-registration and benchmarks: Hypotheses and the analysis plan are lodged with the partner before data. Change is read against published normal trajectories and meaningful-difference thresholds.

04Five Measurement Channels

One battery, read across every study.

The same five channels run in every cohort, so data pools into one evidence base instead of scattering into unrelated pilots.

Biomedical markers

Heart-rate variability, diurnal cortisol slope, sleep and resting heart rate.

Reads on Regulation, Resilience

Self-report

Validated wellbeing, stress, emotion-regulation and flourishing measures, plus a MABERT capacity self-report in development.

Reads on Awareness, Understanding, Fulfilment

MABERT leader report

Structured observation of each participant across the six capacities, session by session.

Reads on Regulation, Transformation

Friend or informant report

A nominated person rates observable change, so nothing rests on self-report alone.

Reads on Transformation, Resilience

Goal movement

Goal Attainment Scaling: personalised goals scored on a fixed scale, scoped to the sprint.

Reads on Transformation, Understanding

05The Studies

Three cohorts, one machine.

Everything needed to judge the shape of a study is on the card. The measurement plan and the six-week split are a click away.

Children In design

Children, through play and building

Regulation and relational safety taught to children through collaborative building and play, where a child practises staying present, taking turns and repairing when a build falls.

Setting: Partner schools and children's clinics. Whole participating groups take part.
Delivery: Small groups using structured collaborative building and floor play, with facilitator co-regulation.
Design: Multiple baseline across groups, staggered by enrolment wave. Every group receives the full programme; only the start dates differ.

Six-week sprint, long arm in parallel See the design →

Adults, students In design

University students

An integrated wellbeing sprint for students, run with the university that also measures it, so the participant pool and the measurement partner are the same institution.

Setting: Partner universities, recruited through student wellbeing services, courses and broader outreach.
Delivery: Cohort programme, blended in person and digital.
Design: Multiple baseline across enrolment waves, timed to the academic calendar. No student is placed on a waitlist arm.

Six-week sprint, long arm in parallel See the design →

Employees In design

A whole company, team by team

Whole teams enrol at once, and start in sequence. Every team receives MABERT; the order of the rollout is the comparison, so no one waits in a control arm.

Setting: One employer, whole teams or departments, delivered as a standing benefit.
Delivery: Team cohorts, blended in person and digital, rolled out team by team.
Design: Stepped-wedge rollout. Every team receives the programme; teams begin one after another, and that sequence is what gives the study its comparison.

Six-week sprint, long arm in parallel See the design →

Every sprint ends on a paper. The cadence is the point.

The Working Papers cadence Collaborate on a study