Title: Towards a Holistic Approach to Designing Theory-based Mobile Health Interventions,
Abstract: Increasing evidence has shown that theory-based health behavior change
interventions are more effective than non-theory-based ones. However, only a
few segments of relevant studies were theory-based, especially the studies
conducted by non-psychology researchers. On the other hand, many mobile health
interventions, even those based on the behavioral theories, may still fail in
the absence of a user-centered design process. The gap between behavioral
theories and user-centered design increases the difficulty of designing and
implementing mobile health interventions. To bridge this gap, we propose a
holistic approach to designing theory-based mobile health interventions built
on the existing theories and frameworks of three categories: (1) behavioral
theories (e.g., the Social Cognitive Theory, the Theory of Planned Behavior,
and the Health Action Process Approach), (2) the technological models and
frameworks (e.g., the Behavior Change Techniques, the Persuasive System Design
and Behavior Change Support System, and the Just-in-Time Adaptive
Interventions), and (3) the user-centered systematic approaches (e.g., the
CeHRes Roadmap, the Wendel's Approach, and the IDEAS Model). This holistic
approach provides researchers a lens to see the whole picture for developing
mobile health interventions.