School of Information, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States.
Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, & Reproductive Biology and the Division of Public Health, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, United States.
J Med Internet Res. 2022 Mar 30;24(3):e34300. doi: 10.2196/34300.
Digital interventions have gained momentum in terms of behavioral health. However, owing to lacking standard approaches or tools for creating digital behavioral interventions, clinical researchers follow widely varying conceptions of how best to go about digital intervention development. Researchers also face significant cost-, time-, and expertise-related challenges in digital intervention development. Improving the availability of tools and guidance for researchers will require a thorough understanding of the motivations and needs of researchers seeking to create digital interventions.
This study aims to understand the perceptions of behavioral researchers toward digital interventions, and inform the use of these interventions, by documenting the reasons why researchers are increasingly focusing their efforts on digital interventions and their perspectives on the perceived benefits that digital approaches can provide for researchers and intervention recipients.
We conducted semistructured qualitative interviews with 18 researchers who had experience designing digital behavioral interventions or running studies with them. A convenience sample of interviewees was recruited from among users of the Computerized Intervention Authoring System platform, a web-based tool that facilitates the process of creating and deploying digital interventions in behavioral research. Interviews were conducted over teleconference between February and April 2020. Recordings from the interviews were transcribed and thematically analyzed by multiple coders.
Interviews were completed with 18 individuals and lasted between 24 and 65 (mean 46.9, SD 11.3) minutes. Interviewees were predominantly female (17/18, 94%) and represented different job roles, ranging from researcher to project or study staff. Four major themes came out of the interviews concerning the benefits of digital interventions for behavioral health: convenience and flexibility for interventionists and recipients, support for implementing evidence-based interventions with fidelity, scaling and improving access to interventions, and getting a foot in the door despite stigma and disenfranchisement.
Interviewees described a number of important potential benefits of digital interventions, particularly with respect to scientific rigor, scalability, and overcoming barriers to reaching more people. There are complex considerations with regard to translating behavior change strategies into digital forms of delivery, and interventionists make individual, sometimes unexpected, choices with minimal evidence of their relative effectiveness. Future research should investigate how behavioral researchers can be supported in making these choices toward usability, ease of access, and approachability of digital interventions. Our study underscores the need for authoring platforms that can facilitate the process of creating and deploying digital interventions to reach their full potential for interventionists and recipients alike.
数字干预措施在行为健康方面发展势头强劲。然而，由于缺乏创建数字行为干预措施的标准方法或工具，临床研究人员对于如何最好地开展数字干预措施的开发有着广泛不同的理解。研究人员在开发数字干预措施方面还面临着成本、时间和专业知识相关的重大挑战。为了提高研究人员可用的工具和指导，需要深入了解寻求创建数字干预措施的研究人员的动机和需求。
本研究旨在通过记录研究人员越来越关注数字干预措施的原因，以及他们对数字方法可以为研究人员和干预措施接受者提供的益处的看法，了解行为研究人员对数字干预措施的看法，并为其提供信息。
我们对 18 名有设计数字行为干预措施或使用数字行为干预措施开展研究经验的研究人员进行了半结构式定性访谈。通过计算机化干预创作系统平台的用户中进行了便利抽样，该平台是一个基于网络的工具，可简化数字干预措施的创建和部署过程。访谈于 2020 年 2 月至 4 月期间通过电话会议进行。对访谈的录音进行了转录，并由多名编码员进行了主题分析。
完成了 18 名个人的访谈，持续时间为 24 至 65 分钟（平均 46.9 分钟，SD 11.3）。受访者主要为女性（17/18，94%），代表不同的工作角色，从研究人员到项目或研究人员。访谈中出现了四个关于数字干预措施对行为健康的益处的主要主题：干预者和接受者的方便和灵活性、支持以保真度实施基于证据的干预措施、扩大和改善干预措施的可及性、以及尽管存在耻辱感和排斥感，但仍能入门。
受访者描述了数字干预措施的一些重要潜在益处，特别是在科学严谨性、可扩展性和克服接触更多人群的障碍方面。将行为改变策略转化为数字形式的交付方式存在复杂的考虑因素，干预者会根据其相对有效性做出个人的、有时出乎意料的选择。未来的研究应调查如何支持行为研究人员做出可用性、易于访问和数字干预措施的可接近性方面的选择。我们的研究强调了需要有创作平台来促进数字干预措施的创建和部署，以充分发挥其对干预者和接受者的潜力。
