Improving Behavioral Health Intervention Technologies: Harnessing the Human Side of Apps

Health apps have become common, with thousands on app stores. Among the most common are those that address mental health problems. However, it is increasingly apparent that these apps are not used, even by those who download them. There are two general strategies that harness human connection to address the problem. The first is to link apps into human processes of care. The Supportive Accountability Model indicates that patients are more likely to engage in behaviors if they know that a valued human provider is receiving information about that behavior, and that they are likely to discuss that information at some point in the future. An example of the use of a human relationship to promote engagement is MedLink, a mobile app designed to improve the quality of pharmacotherapy for depression by providing information on medication adherence and symptoms to physicians and promoting communication around care. Supportive Accountability is also being used to define human coaching to increase user adherence to health apps. The second strategy to promote engagement with health apps is to improve their design. Given that connecting human support to apps increases engagement, it raises the question: can apps be designed to instantiate some of those human qualities that promote engagement? A growing literature on Computers are Social Actors (CASA) indicates that humans make social attributions to computing technologies even if they believe it is not reasonable to do so. Using findings from the CASA literature on user and technology characteristics that promote social attributions to technologies, we have developed a model of social attributions to behavioral intervention technologies that may harness this phenomenon to increase app usage and effectiveness. Future directions for investigating and deploying both strategies will be described in the context of an upcoming trial of mobile apps targeting depressive symptoms.

Speaker Details

Colleen is a doctoral candidate in Clinical Psychology at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, conducting research at the Center for Behavioral Intervention Technologies (CBITs). She is supported by an NIMH-funded training grant for her current research, which involves linking psychological theory and design to guide the creation and evaluation of mobile health apps for depression.

Series:
Microsoft Research Talks
Date:
Speakers:
Colleen Stiles-Shields
Affiliation:
Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine

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Series: Microsoft Research Talks