About this Code
This example code is for the curation and analysis of data from a micro-randomized trial (MRT) similar to the Self-Relevant Appeals to Engage in Self-Monitoring of Alcohol Use MRT. Although prior research indicates that self-monitoring of alcohol use can mitigate alcohol misuse, engagement in digital self-monitoring remains suboptimal among young adults. The MRT was designed to estimate the effect of just in time digital prompts (reminders) on engagement in self-monitoring for alcohol use among college students. The different types of digital prompts were compared based on the proximal outcome, whether the participant completed self-monitoring of alcohol use within the 3 days of the digital prompt being sent.
How can a behavioral scientist use this code?
Behavioral intervention scientists can use this code as a starting point for the curation and analysis of data from an MRT that is similar to Self-Relevant Appeals to Engage in Self-Monitoring of Alcohol Use.
Note: The material on this page does not include data from this study.
Note from the study’s Principal Investigator:
The investigative team recognizes the importance and benefit of sharing data from this research study to ensure accuracy of results via replication and reproduction, to increase generalizability of results, and to promote and facilitate future research in this area. It is our goal to make available data to external institutions. External investigators expressing an interest in accessing a particular data set will be required to sign a data sharing agreement that is approved by the University of Minnesota. Identifiers of raw data will be purged to protect subject confidentiality. A complete, cleaned, de-identified copy of the final dataset used in conducting the final analyses will be made available. The dataset will be available by request from the PI of R01 AA026574 (Patrick, M.E.).
Related References
1. Carpenter, S. M., Patrick, M., Morrell, N., & Nahum-Shani, I. (2021, February 16). Leveraging Self-Relevance to Engage Young Adults in Self-Monitoring of Alcohol Use. https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/DKVZ3
This reference contains the study protocol which was pre-specified prior to the curation and analysis of data from the MRT. Four research questions were specified in the protocol, of which, three were tackled by the example code above and the reference below (Carpenter et al., 2022). For readers comparing this protocol to the reference below, we note that although there are differences in the actual language used to describe the research questions, the essence of what is being investigated remains the same.
2. Carpenter, S. M., Yap, J., Patrick, M. E., Morrell, N., Dziak, J. J., Almirall, D., … & Nahum-Shani, I. (2022). Self-relevant appeals to engage in self-monitoring of alcohol use: A microrandomized trial. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors.
This reference contains the results of the investigation of three of the four research questions which were pre-specified in the protocol above.
3. Patrick, M. E., Boatman, J. A., Morrell, N., Wagner, A. C., Lyden, G. R., Nahum-Shani, I., … & Almirall, D. (2020). A sequential multiple assignment randomized trial (SMART) protocol for empirically developing an adaptive preventive intervention for college student drinking reduction. Contemporary clinical trials, 96, 106089.
A peculiar aspect of participants included in the study described by Carpenter and colleagues (Carpenter et al., 2021 & 2022, above, and from here onward referred to as the ‘smaller trial’) is that these same participants were simultaneously included in a larger trial to inform the development of an Adaptive Preventive Intervention (API) for reducing binge drinking among undergraduates enrolled as first-year students in a large Midwestern University for the 2019–2020 academic year. The design of this larger trial and the research question this larger study investigated are described in this reference while the connection between this larger trial and the smaller trial is also described by Carpenter and colleagues (Carpenter et al., 2022, above).
Related News
1. Update on 2019-04-29: The study was registered on clinicaltrials.gov
Record on classic clinicaltrials.gov site: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/study/NCT03930524
Record on new (beta version) clinicaltrials.gov site: https://beta.clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT03930524?patient=adaptive%20preventive%20intervention&locStr=&distance=0