Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Formative Research
Date Submitted: Dec 8, 2021
Open Peer Review Period: Dec 8, 2021 - Feb 2, 2022
Date Accepted: Aug 26, 2022
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
User Behavior of a Publicly Available, Free-to-Use, Self-guided mHealth App for Depression: Observational Study in a Global Sample
ABSTRACT
Background:
The scope and impact of depression worldwide is breathtaking. Reducing the global burden of depression will require a multi-pronged approach.
Objective:
The purpose of this study is to examine naturalistic user behavior of MoodTools, a publicly available, self-guided mHealth app designed to improve symptoms of depression, in a global community sample.
Methods:
Mobile analytics data was collected from all unique downloads of the Android version of MoodTools between March 1, 2016 and February 28, 2018.
Results:
MoodTools was used by 158,930 people from 198 countries. 51.14% of users returned to the app after initial download. The typical person used the app for 3 sessions for a total of 12 minutes over the span of 90 days. Users most often visited tools designed for self-monitoring of symptoms and for targeting a core mechanism of depressive psychopathology, negative cognitions.
Conclusions:
Results suggest that there is global interest in a publicly available app for improving depression. Self-guided apps like MoodTools, therefore, could be a tool in the toolbox to address the global burden of depression. Future research is needed to determine whether people who use self-guided apps experience improvement in depressive symptoms. Given the low motivation and behavioral avoidance associated with the disorder, a key challenge for self-guided apps for depression is to engage and to retain users. Clinical Trial: none, not a trial
Citation
Request queued. Please wait while the file is being generated. It may take some time.
Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.