assessment

On the merits of using mobile devices to study drinking and other behaviors

On the merits of using mobile devices to study drinking and other behaviors

In a recent special issue of Alcohol Research: Current Reviews, a peer-reviewed publication that reviews the latest in alcohol research and is published by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), we were invited to review the latest available scientific research on using mobile devices to study behavior, and its potential to improve health. The special issue focused on mobile health (mHealth) research, so we fit right in! Pretty cool! 

Asking participants to recount their behaviors day-by-day may help us study them

Asking participants to recount their behaviors day-by-day may help us study them

Not exactly ground-breaking, but a necessary part of science! We're always trying to sort out the best way to study behaviors, especially because it's pretty tricky when people may be embarrassed about them or have a tough time remembering them. In this paper, we showed that one useful approach to collecting data about sensitive behaviors is to ask participants to recount them, day-by-day.