Reach and Scalability of Digital Therapeutics for Childhood Behavior Problems

What this Trial Is About

Researchers are evaluating a mobile health (mHealth) system called UseIt! to help parents manage disruptive behavior in children aged 5 to 8 years. This study compares the effectiveness of the UseIt! app used alone, the app combined with coach support, and a control mindfulness app. The goal is to understand which approach best supports parents and achieves wide reach and scalability for managing behavior problems. Parents will be randomly assigned to one of three groups: using the standalone UseIt! app, using the UseIt! app with added coach assistance, or using the mindfulness control app called SmilingMind. Parents will use their assigned app for four months, receiving phone training on how to use the UseIt! system in about 30 minutes. The coach, for those in the coach-assisted group, is a paraprofessional who supports motivation and engagement but does not provide clinical therapy. Participants will complete assessments online at baseline, after four months of app use, and at a six-month follow-up. These assessments include surveys that take about an hour to complete and measure parenting knowledge and skill use, as well as child behavior symptoms. The primary outcome is measured by the Knowledge of Effective Parenting Test (KEPT) at both post-treatment and follow-up. Secondary outcomes include diaries of parenting skill use and behavior symptom scales. The study plans to enroll 324 families and will continue until April 2027.

Digital Therapeutics for Behavior Problems