JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Despite the global impact of COVID-19, there are few measures and limited data on underlying willingness to engage in public health-indicated actions in response to health crises, including the use of mHealth tools for screening and tracking. Studies typically rely on individual items rather than validated scales. The development of new scales can elucidate how populations differ in their underlying willingness to engage in preventive behaviors, including mHealth-based tracking, and factors associated with such willingness. Researchers and practitioners can adapt such measures to future crises or pandemics.

Objective:

We tested the psychometric properties of a novel measure of willingness to participate in pandemic-related screening and tracking, including willingness to use pandemic-related mHealth tools, as there are no such scales that can be adapted to future crises.

Methods:

Data were from a cross-sectional, national probability survey deployed in three waves several weeks apart to adult residents of the United States from the AmeriSpeak probability-based research panel covering approximately 97% of the US household population. Five items asked about willingness to use mHealth tools for COVID-related screening and tracking and test for COVID-19 by providing biological specimens.

Results:

In the first, exploratory sample (N=2,190), three of five items loaded onto one underlying factor, willingness to use pandemic-related mHealth tools, based on exploratory factor analysis. In the second, validation sample (N=2,238), the reliability of this measure was high, one underlying factor was confirmed, and the variable was independently associated with COVID-19-preventive behaviors and willingness to provide biological specimens for testing. In the third, multiple-group sample (N=2,047), the measure was invariant, or measured the same thing in the same way, across age groups, gender, racial/ethnic groups, and education level.

Conclusions:

The screener shows strong psychometric properties in this evaluation and can be adapted to future public health crises. Black, Hispanic, and other non-White adults showed greater willingness to use pandemic-related mHealth tools than White adults, which may have indicated greater mistrust of mHealth tools related to COVID-19, and potentially mistrust of the public health response in general, among White adults reflected in the sample.