Effectiveness of a multicultural technique to improve the mood of Peruvian university students

The COVID-19 pandemic affected the mental health and academic performance of university students, prompting institutions to take action. This study evaluated the effectiveness of the intercultural technique Pukllasun in reducing anxiety among Andean Peruvian students during the pandemic. In a quasi-experimental study, 181 participants were included, divided into an intervention group (IG = 49) and a control group (CG = 132), assessed with the Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) test at the beginning and end of the study. The average age was 19.2 years (SD = 2.1) in the IG and 20.3 years (SD = 2.8) in the CG. A Student's t-test was used to analyze differences between and within groups, and Cohen's d was used to measure the effectiveness of the intervention. Initially, both groups had similar anxiety levels (t = 1.09; p = 0.246), but by the end of the study, significant differences were observed in favor of the IG, both between groups (t = 3.28; p = 0.00) and within groups (t = 2.42; p = 0.02), with large effect sizes (d = 1.68 and d = 1.38). The Pukllasun activities effectively reduced anxiety, highlighting the importance of adapting culturally relevant interventions in various educational contexts.