JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Recent research has investigated the utility of mobile phone-delivered interventions for reducing risky single occasion drinking (RSOD, also known as binge drinking). In the past five years, focus has been placed on Ecological Momentary Interventions (EMI), which aim to deliver intervention content in correspondence to real-time assessments of behaviour (also known as Ecological Momentary Assessments; EMA).

Objective:

This study aims to assess the effect of a tailored, mobile phone-delivered Ecological Momentary Intervention (MIDY) on young people's risky single occasion drinking behaviour.

Methods:

We will use a three-armed randomised controlled trial design to determine the impact of MIDY on peak consumption of alcohol among young people. A list of mobile telephone numbers for random digit dialling will be generated and researchers will telephone potential participants and screen for eligibility. Participants will be randomized into 1 of 3 intervention groups. For 6 weeks, EMI, EMA and Attention Control groups will complete hourly EMA surveys on their mobile phone on Friday and Saturday nights. EMI participants will receive personalised feedback SMS messages corresponding to their EMA survey responses, which focus on alcohol consumption, spending and mood. EMI participants will not receive feedback SMS. A third group will also complete EMAs and receive feedback messages at the same time intervals, but focused on sedentary behaviour and technology use. All groups will also complete a short survey on Saturday and Sunday mornings, with the primary outcome measure taken on Sunday mornings. A more detailed survey will be sent on the final Sunday of the 6-week period, and then again one year after recruitment.

Results:

The primary outcome measure will be an observed change (i.e. reduction) in the mean peak number of drinks consumed in a single night, over the six-week intervention period between those receiving the intervention (EMI) and attention control participants (AC), as measured in the weekly EMAs. We expect to see a greater reduction in mean peak drinking in the EMI group, compared to the attention control group. We also expect that the EMA group will show a reduction in mean peak drinking, compared to the attention control group. We will use a random effects mixed modelling approach using maximum likelihood estimation to provide estimates of differences in peak drinking across time between those receiving the intervention EMI and attention control participants. An intention-to-treat approach will be taken to analysis. Individuals and study group will be modelled as random and fixed factors respectively.

Conclusions:

This study extends our previous work investigating the efficacy of a mobile EMI, MIDY, for reducing risky drinking among young adults in Australia, and will add to the proliferating literature on the use of mobile interventions for reducing risky alcohol consumption. Clinical Trial: This trial was registered with the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry in October 2017. ANZCTR number: ACTRN12617001509358p