Milward Joanna, Deluca Paolo, Drummond Colin, Watson Rod, Dunne Jacklyn, Kimergård Andreas
Addictions Department, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Health Innovation Network, London, United Kingdom.
JMIR Mhealth Uhealth. 2017 Aug 8;5(8):e109. doi: 10.2196/mhealth.7836.
Electronic screening and brief intervention (eSBI) apps demonstrate potential to reduce harmful drinking. However, low user engagement rates with eSBI reduce overall effectiveness of interventions. As "Digital Natives," young adults have high expectations of app quality. Ensuring that the design, content, and functionality of an eSBI app are acceptable to young adults is an integral stage to the development process.
The objective of this study was to identify usability barriers and enablers for an app, BRANCH, targeting harmful drinking in young adults.
The BRANCH app contains a drinking diary, alcohol reduction goal setting functions, normative drinking feedback, and information on risks and advice for cutting down. The app includes a social feature personalized to motivate cutting down and to promote engagement with a point-based system for usage. Three focus groups were conducted with 20 users who had tested the app for 1 week. A detailed thematic analysis was undertaken.
The first theme, "Functionality" referred to how users wanted an easy-to-use interface, with minimum required user-input. Poor functionality was considered a major usability barrier. The second theme, "Design" described how an aesthetic with minimum text, clearly distinguishable tabs and buttons and appealing infographics was integral to the level of usability. The final theme, "Content" described how participants wanted all aspects of the app to be automatically personalized to them, as well as providing them with opportunities to personalize the app themselves, with increased options for social connectivity.
There are high demands for apps such as BRANCH that target skilled technology users including young adults. Key areas to optimize eSBI app development that emerged from testing BRANCH with representative users include high-quality functionality, appealing aesthetics, and improved personalization.
电子筛查与简短干预（eSBI）应用程序显示出减少有害饮酒的潜力。然而，eSBI的低用户参与率降低了干预措施的整体效果。作为“数字原住民”，年轻人对应用程序质量有很高期望。确保eSBI应用程序的设计、内容和功能为年轻人所接受是开发过程中不可或缺的阶段。
本研究的目的是确定一款针对年轻人有害饮酒的应用程序BRANCH的可用性障碍和促进因素。
BRANCH应用程序包含饮酒日记、减少饮酒目标设定功能、规范性饮酒反馈以及关于减少饮酒风险和建议的信息。该应用程序包括一个个性化的社交功能，以激励减少饮酒并促进用户参与基于积分系统的使用。对20名已测试该应用程序1周的用户进行了三个焦点小组访谈。进行了详细的主题分析。
第一个主题“功能”指的是用户希望有一个易于使用的界面，所需用户输入最少。功能不佳被认为是一个主要的可用性障碍。第二个主题“设计”描述了一种美学，即文本最少、标签和按钮清晰可辨以及有吸引力的信息图表对于可用性水平至关重要。最后一个主题“内容”描述了参与者希望应用程序的所有方面都能自动为他们个性化，同时也为他们提供自己个性化应用程序的机会，并增加社交连接选项。
对于BRANCH这类针对包括年轻人在内的熟练技术用户的应用程序有很高要求。通过对具有代表性的用户测试BRANCH而出现的优化eSBI应用程序开发的关键领域包括高质量功能、吸引人的美学和改进的个性化。
