1. S
The Three Zones of
Assessment:
A Research Proposal
Nick French
7/8/14
Adler School of Professional Psychology

2. The Three Zones of
Assessment
S Developed by survival expert,
Les Stroud. Designed for
individuals that find themselves
stranded in the wilderness. He
defines the three zones as
follows:
S Zone 1: What do I have on me?
S Zone 2: What is in my immediate
area?
S Zone 3: What is beyond my
immediate area?

3. Adapting the Three Zones for
Mental Health
S In this proposal, The Three Zones of Assessment has
been adapted for the purpose of anxiety reduction and
control.
S Those who experience anxiety would define panic attacks
as a “life or death” way of responding to a stressor.
Hence, why the three zones could possibly be applied to
a non-wilderness situation as a coping tool.
S For this proposal, we will use T3ZOA as an acronym
to represent The 3 Zones of Assessment.

4. T3ZOA
The newly adapted zones will
be defined as follows:
Zone 1: What is going on with
me (physically,
psychologically,
physiologically)?
Zone 2: What is going on in
my immediate area?
Zone 3: How do I envision
myself overcoming this
anxiety situation?

5. Research Question,
Hypothesis, and Justification
S Question: Is T3ZOA an effective coping tool for those
suffering from anxiety?
S Hypothesis: Those who learned the T3ZOA material
reported lower anxiety levels during the experiment than
those who did not receive the materials.
S Justification: To provide a tangible, easy to use coping
tool that anxiety sufferers can use to aid their treatment
process.

6. Research
Design, Part
1
Type of Research: Artistically
Styled Qualitative Research,
with an emphasis on the
“theatrical” and “role-play”
aspect. This will create a more
authentic anxiety experience,
giving the results more
external validity. This model is
rooted in the MFT field, and
was utilized by some of our
founders in Carl Whitaker and
Salvador Minuchin (Sprenkle
& Piercy, 2005).

7. Research Design, Part 2
S Researchers will recruit participants that qualify for all
types of anxiety disorders. Those with personality
disorders will be excluded.
S Qualified participants will take the State-Trait Anxiety
Inventory Questionnaire (STAI). Resulting scores will be
recorded as a baseline measurement.
S Scores on the STAI range from 20-80. The higher the
score, the higher the anxiety.

8. Research Design, Part 3:
Participants
Group A
S Receives T3ZOA education
material as part of individual
therapy session.
Group B
S Does not receive educational
material as part of individual
therapy session.

9. Research Design, Part 4
The Experiment
S The therapist tells them during the individual session that the
materials will “need to be used soon.” This will be aimed to
activate the participants’ anxiety. The participants will then leave
the therapy room and enter the waiting room, where there will be a
large crowd of people. This will also work to activate anxiety. Here,
the client will need to reside in the waiting room for five minutes
before a therapist comes to retrieve them.
S Participants will have been casually instructed by the therapist to
“wait 5 minutes in the waiting room before another therapist
comes to retrieve them for an outcome interview.”

10. Research
Design, Part
5
• Group B will go through the
same waiting room routine, but
will not have received the
coping tools beforehand. They
will receive them afterwards.
• Both groups will be interviewed
regarding their experience.
Anxiety levels will be compared
between them.
• A follow up interview for both
Groups will be made three
months later. Have they been
using T3ZOA? If so, how has it
helped? If so, how do their
average anxiety levels compare
to the anxiety levels reported
before the experiment?

11. Measures
S Self-reported anxiety levels will be provided by the
participants using a scale of 1-10, along with scores
indicated by the STAI. These will be averaged out
amongst the two groups and compared.
S Self reported anxiety experiences will be measured and
told in story form (the words of the clients). Such stories
will be laid out in sequence for the readers to experience.
This accommodates the complexity of the human
experience by giving room for unique explanations.

12. Data Analysis
S Continuous measurement variables:
• Anxiety scores provided before,
during, and in the three month follow
up.
S Categorical measurement variables:
• (1) Before: how they have been
experiencing anxiety up until this
point.
• (2) During: how they experienced
anxiety during the experiment.
• (3) After: in the three month follow
up (how they have been
experiencing anxiety since the
experiment).

13. T3ZOA
Coming soon to a therapy room near you! (hopefully)

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