Abstract
Background: Thinking skills, including goal setting, problem solving, decision making, and cognitive self-regulation, are essential for adaptive functioning during late adolescence and emerging adulthood. However, evidence for structured interventions targeting these skills remains limited in low- and middle-income countries. UNICEF’s Basic Life Skills Training Program (BLSTP) aims to strengthen these competencies, but previous evaluations lacked active control conditions. Method: A three-arm randomized controlled trial was conducted with 90 Pakistani university students (18–24 years) reporting at least average executive-functioning difficulties. Participants were randomly assigned to the BLSTP thinking-skills module, an attention-matched active control program, or a waitlist control group. Outcomes included goal setting, decision making and problem solving, critical and creative thinking, executive functioning, and resilience, assessed at baseline, post-test, and one-month follow-up. Results: Mixed-design repeated-measures ANOVA showed significant group × time interactions for all outcomes (all p < 0.001), with medium-to-large effects (Cohen’s d = 0.85–1.49). Improvements were consistently greatest in the BLSTP group, followed by the active control and waitlist groups. Gains in goal setting, decision making and problem solving, and resilience were maintained at follow-up. Conclusion: The BLSTP thinking-skills module appears to be an effective and feasible intervention for enhancing self-regulatory competencies among university students. Findings also emphasize the value of active controls in evaluating life-skills interventions and supporting their scalable implementation.