Adaptive Just-in-Time Intervention to Reduce Everyday Stress Responses: Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial

Area of Science:

• Behavioral science
• Digital health
• Psychophysiology

Background:

• Personalized behavior change interventions are crucial for improving mental and physical health.
• Reducing stress response intensity, duration, and frequency is a key mechanism for health behavior improvement.
• A novel ambulatory, dynamic stress measurement approach identifies personalized stress responses in real-time.

Purpose of the Study:

• Evaluate a smartphone-delivered just-in-time (JIT) stress management intervention's impact on stress reactivity, nonrecovery, and pileup.
• Assess the JIT intervention's effect on daily health behaviors, including physical activity and sleep.
• Explore the mediating role of stress response changes in the intervention's effects on health behaviors.

Main Methods:

• A 2-arm phase 2 clinical trial with 210 adults randomized to JIT intervention or active control for 2 weeks.
• Daily smartphone surveys and wearable devices for sleep and physical activity monitoring over 4 weeks.
• Mixed-effects models to analyze differences in stress responses and health behaviors between groups.

Main Results:

• Participant recruitment completed with 213 adults enrolled between August 2022 and June 2023.
• Data processing is ongoing; formal analyses have not yet commenced.
• Preliminary findings on intervention efficacy and mediation are pending.

Conclusions:

• The study is expected to advance stress measurement techniques and understanding of health behavior change mechanisms.
• Findings will provide a conceptual framework for developing effective JIT interventions for stress management.
• This research aims to enhance personalized stress management strategies for improved health outcomes.