scholarly journals User engagement and utilisation of an app for anxiety management: analysis and evaluation of usage patterns (Preprint)

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Matthews ◽  
Phil Topham ◽  
Praminda Caleb-Solly
Keyword(s):  
Social Participation ◽  
Mobile App ◽  
Cloud Services ◽  
Anxiety Reduction ◽  
User Engagement ◽  
Anxiety Management ◽  
Self Help ◽  
The Social ◽  
Behavioural Engagement ◽  
Usage Patterns

BACKGROUND SAM is a mobile app providing self-help for anxiety management. Launched in 2013, the app has achieved over a 1 million downloads and favourable ratings on the platform app stores. Key features of the app are anxiety monitoring, self-help techniques and social support via an online forum (“the social cloud”). This paper presents unique insights into e-mental health app usage patterns and explores user behaviour and usage of self-help techniques. OBJECTIVE To investigate behavioural engagement and to establish discernible usage patterns of the app linked to the features of: anxiety monitoring, rating of self-help techniques and social participation. METHODS We use data mining techniques on aggregate data from registered users of the app’s cloud services RESULTS Engagement in general conforms to common online participation patterns, with an inverted pyramid or “funnel” of engagement of increasing intensity. We further identify four distinct groups of behavioural engagement, differentiated by levels of activity in anxiety monitoring and social feature usage. Anxiety levels among all monitoring users show a marked reduction in the first few days of usage, with some “bounce back” effect thereafter. A small group of users with demonstrable long-term anxiety reduction (using a robust measure) typically monitored for 12-110 days with 10-30 discrete updates and showed low levels of social participation. CONCLUSIONS The data supports our expectation of different usage patterns given flexible user journeys and varying commitment in an unstructured mobile usage setting. We nevertheless show an aggregate trend of reduction in self-reported anxiety across all minimally engaged users. We find several commonalities between these patterns and traditional therapy engagement.

scholarly journals Interaction and Engagement with an Anxiety Management App: Analysis Using Large-Scale Behavioral Data

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. e58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Matthews ◽  
Phil Topham ◽  
Praminda Caleb-Solly
Keyword(s):  
Mobile Phone ◽  
Social Participation ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Cloud Services ◽  
Anxiety Reduction ◽  
Behavioral Engagement ◽  
Anxiety Management ◽  
User Behaviors ◽  
Self Help ◽  
Usage Patterns

BackgroundSAM (Self-help for Anxiety Management) is a mobile phone app that provides self-help for anxiety management. Launched in 2013, the app has achieved over one million downloads on the iOS and Android platform app stores. Key features of the app are anxiety monitoring, self-help techniques, and social support via a mobile forum (“the Social Cloud”). This paper presents unique insights into eMental health app usage patterns and explores user behaviors and usage of self-help techniques.ObjectiveThe objective of our study was to investigate behavioral engagement and to establish discernible usage patterns of the app linked to the features of anxiety monitoring, ratings of self-help techniques, and social participation.MethodsWe use data mining techniques on aggregate data obtained from 105,380 registered users of the app’s cloud services.ResultsEngagement generally conformed to common mobile participation patterns with an inverted pyramid or “funnel” of engagement of increasing intensity. We further identified 4 distinct groups of behavioral engagement differentiated by levels of activity in anxiety monitoring and social feature usage. Anxiety levels among all monitoring users were markedly reduced in the first few days of usage with some bounce back effect thereafter. A small group of users demonstrated long-term anxiety reduction (using a robust measure), typically monitored for 12-110 days, with 10-30 discrete updates and showed low levels of social participation.ConclusionsThe data supported our expectation of different usage patterns, given flexible user journeys, and varying commitment in an unstructured mobile phone usage setting. We nevertheless show an aggregate trend of reduction in self-reported anxiety across all minimally-engaged users, while noting that due to the anonymized dataset, we did not have information on users also enrolled in therapy or other intervention while using the app. We find several commonalities between these app-based behavioral patterns and traditional therapy engagement.

scholarly journals Theory-Based Social and Non-Social Engagement Features in Smoking Cessation Mobile Apps: A Content Analysis

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (17) ◽  
pp. 9106
Author(s):  
Qinghua Yang
Keyword(s):  
Social Support ◽  
Smoking Cessation ◽  
Content Analysis ◽  
Social Engagement ◽  
Rating Scale ◽  
Mobile Apps ◽  
Mobile App ◽  
Social Referencing ◽  
User Engagement ◽  
The Social

Despite the ubiquity of smartphone ownership and the increasing integration of social engagement features in smoking cessation apps to engage users, the social and non-social engagement features that are present in current smoking cessation apps and the effectiveness of these features in engaging users remain understudied. To fill the gap in the literature, a content analysis of free and paid smoking cessation mobile apps was conducted to examine (a) the presence of social features (i.e., social support, social announcement, and social referencing) and non-social engagement features (e.g., personal environmental changes, goal setting, progress tracking, reinforcement tracking, self-monitoring, and personalized recommendations) and (b) their relationships with user engagement scores measured by the Mobile App Rating Scale. In this study, 28.2% of the smoking cessation apps enable social announcement and 8.1% offered the social support feature. Only two apps provided a social referencing feature (1.3%). No app included reinforcement tracking, with the percentage of other non-social engagement features ranging from 9.4% to 49.0%. Social support (β = 0.30, p < 0.001), social announcement (β = 0.21, p < 0.05), and social referencing (β = 0.18, p < 0.05) were significant predictors of user engagement. Regarding the non-social engagement features, personal environment changes (β = 0.38, p < 0.001), progress tracking (β = 0.18, p < 0.05), and personalized recommendations (β = 0.37, p < 0.001) significantly predicted user engagement. The findings not only contribute to the mobile communication literature by applying and extending the theory-based mobile health apps engagement typology, but also inform the future architecture design of smoking cessation mobile apps.

Success of Self Help Group – Bank Linkage Program in India under Financial Inclusion

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ritu Singh
Keyword(s):  
Rural Areas ◽  
Commercial Banks ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Functional Reach ◽  
Self Help ◽  
Geographical Spread ◽  
The Social ◽  
Linkage Program ◽  
Self Help Group

The ‘social banking’ policies being followed by the country resulted in widening the geographical spread and functional reach of commercial banks in rural areas in the period that followed the nationalization of banks. This paper is concluded with a view that SHG – Bank Linkage program is a success in our country India and helping many people to make their life better.

scholarly journals A Mobile App to Optimize Social Participation for Individuals with Physical Disabilities: Content Validation and Usability Testing

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 1753
Author(s):  
Dahlia Kairy ◽  
Mir Abolfazl Mostafavi ◽  
Catherine Blanchette-Dallaire ◽  
Eva Belanger ◽  
Andrea Corbeil ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Social Participation ◽  
Physical Disabilities ◽  
Mobile App ◽  
User Centered Design ◽  
Mobility Limitations ◽  
User Friendliness ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
Information Optimization

Background: Social participation is beneficial for individuals’ health. However, people with disabilities that may lead to mobility limitations tend to experience lower levels of social participation. Information and communication technologies such as the OnRoule mobile application (app) can help promote social participation. Objectives: To obtain potential users’ perceptions on the usability and content of the OnRoule app for providing information on accessibility, as well as its potential to optimize social participation. Materials and Methods: Cross-sectional user-centered design study. Individuals with physical disabilities (n = 18) were recruited through community organizations and interviewed using a semi-structured guide. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using thematic analysis. Results: Three main themes were identified: (1) “user-friendliness”; (2) “balance between the amount and relevance of information”; and (3) “potential use of the app”. Discussion and Conclusion: Findings from this study indicated that the app was easy to use, had pertinent information, and enabled a positive experience of finding information. However, several areas of improvement were identified, such as the clarity of specific elements, organization and amount of information, optimization of features, and inclusiveness. Apps such as OnRoule could optimize social participation by facilitating the process of finding resources in the community and building a sense of connectedness between users.

The effectiveness of a combination of Occupational Therapy and Social Skills Training in people with schizophrenia: A rater-blinded randomized controlled trial

2021 ◽  
pp. 030802262110229
Author(s):  
Selma Ercan Doğu ◽  
Hülya Kayıhan ◽  
Ahmet Kokurcan ◽  
Sibel Örsel
Keyword(s):  
Social Skills ◽  
Occupational Therapy ◽  
Social Participation ◽  
Social Skills Training ◽  
Clinical Symptoms ◽  
Training Group ◽  
Skills Training ◽  
Occupational Performance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Skills Training Group

Introduction This study aimed to assess the impact of a holistic combination of Occupational Therapy and Social Skills Training on occupational performance, social participation, and clinical symptoms in people with schizophrenia. Method 60 people with schizophrenia were randomly assigned to two groups. One group received standardized Social Skills Training once a week for a total of 10 sessions, while the other group received a combination of Occupational Therapy and Social Skills Training once a week for a total of 16 sessions. Results A greater increase was determined in the scores of COPM total performance/satisfaction and the Community Integration Questionnaire in the Occupational Therapy and Social Skills Training group. Furthermore, these achievements were sustained in the Occupational Therapy and Social Skills Training group compared to the Social Skills Training group at the 6-month follow-up. Conclusion The clients received the combination of Occupational Therapy and Social Skills Training showed a better improvement compared to the Social Skills Training group in terms of occupational performance, social participation, and severity of clinical symptoms. The use of Occupational Therapy in a holistic approach in psychosocial rehabilitation of people with schizophrenia can increase their functionality and social participation. Further studies are needed to assess long-term effects of Occupational Therapy in schizophrenia.

The Korean 3T practice: A New Biosurveillance Model utilizing New IT and Digital Tools (Preprint)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
HyunJung Kim
Keyword(s):  
Population Control ◽  
Digital Tools ◽  
Big Brother ◽  
Self Help ◽  
Ex Post ◽  
The Social ◽  
Epidemic Intelligence ◽  
Pandemic Response ◽  
The Government ◽  
Event Based

UNSTRUCTURED South Korea COVID-19 pandemic responses, namely the 3T (testing, tracing, and treating) strategy, come to the fore as a new biosurveillance regime utilizing new IT and digital tools actively. The 3T biosurveillance system is a developed version of the traditional biosurveillance systems (indicator-based or event-based systems), which can provide epidemic intelligence capabilities for both ex ante prevention/preparedness or ex post response/recovery missions. Epidemiological investigation efforts exploiting the use of new digital and IT tools are the ground of the Korean 3T system practicing test, trace, and treatment mission, which can be referred to as ‘contact-based biosurveillance system.’ However, critics argue that the Korea’s 3T strategy may violate individuals’ privacy and human rights in addressing that the Korean biosurveillance system would strengthen the social surveillance and population control by the government as a “digital big brother” in the cyber age. However, closer scrutiny reveals that the Korea’s digital-based biosurveillance system for pandemic response has evolved since the experience of the 2015 Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) outbreak, by citizen’s requests and self-help behaviors

Improving the Perception of Patient-Centered Wellness in a Virtual Population During the COVID-19 Pandemic

2021 ◽  
pp. JDNP-D-20-00078
Author(s):  
Sybilla Myers ◽  
Christopher Kennedy
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Shared Decision Making ◽  
Cognitive Theory ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Mobile App ◽  
Shared Decision ◽  
Patient Centered ◽  
The Social

BackgroundPerceived health-related quality of life (HRQOL) is fundamental to well-being and is a meaningful way to measure physical and mental health.Local ProblemNo standard method exists for measuring perceived HRQOL during the COVID-19 pandemic in participants as they attempt to improve their self-determined wellness goals. An implementation plan that considers the social distancing limitations imposed can be used to predict an individual’s likelihood of long-term success.MethodsDuring the four, 2-week plan-do-study-act (PDSA) cycles, the Social Cognitive Theory model informed the implementation of the four core interventions. To guide iterative changes, the data was analyzed through Excel and run charts.InterventionsThe four core interventions were the shared decision-making tool (SDMT), health mobile app tool (HMAT), wellness tracker tool (WTT), and the team engagement plan.ResultsAmong 28 participants, perceived quality of life increased by 70%, engagement in shared decision-making increased to 82%, app use and confidence increased to 85%, and goal attainment reached 81%.ConclusionsThe SDMT, health app, and wellness tracker created a methodical plan of accountability for increasing participant wellness. The contextual barrier of the COVID-19 pandemic added a negative wellness burden which was mitigated by creating a patient-centered culture of wellness.

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