Underdeveloped or Underreported? Coverage of Pretesting Practices and Recommendations for Design of Text Message–Based Health Behavior Change Interventions

Abstract

Text messaging interventions for health are becoming increasingly popular, but it is unclear how rigorously such interventions are developed and pretested before being implemented. Pretesting is important to the development of successful health communication interventions. This study reviewed the literature published on text messaging health behavior change interventions and examined pretesting practices. Results showed that pretesting is rarely mentioned in articles, although it is not clear as to why. Six articles mentioned pretesting practices conducted for their mobile intervention, and three articles were written specifically on the pretesting of an intervention. Most pretesting used qualitative methods. Recommendations are provided on pretesting best practices and pretesting reporting to help other researchers in the field of mobile health.