Insight Study Creation Wiki

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We recommend creating the study in order of the following steps:

1. Configure the Study Tab

2. Create Groups

3. Create Questions

4. Create Assessments

5. Create Stages

6. Create Events 

7. Configure Events

8. Configure Notifications (Optional)

9. Create and configure subject Payments (JITAI Tier only, Optional)

10. Sensor Incorporation (JITAI Tier Only, Optional)

11. Create Study Permissions

12. Test Your Study Settings

13. Download Encrypted Study Data

14. Create and Enroll Participants

15. Wipe Data from Lost/Stolen Phones

16. Participant Dashboard Settings and Features

Configure the Study Tab

1. Name your study by typing a name into the Study Name field. This name will appear at the top of the app home screen.

2. In the Status Field, select Development while the app is in development, or select Active when the app has been fully developed and you are ready to begin enrolling study participants.

3. If desired, in the Staff Phone field, type a phone number that participants can click in order to connect them with your research staff. If you use this feature, a Call Staff button will populate on the top right hand corner of the app home screen.

4. If desired, in the Counselor Phone field, type a phone number that participants use to connect them with a counselor/nurse/doctor/etc. If you use this feature, a Call Counselor button will populate on the Insight application home screen.

5. In Assessment Timeout Minutes, type the number of minutes that you would like participants to have to complete each assessment. The assessment will automatically end when time runs out. Insight will record the duration of each initiated assessment and this information will be saved in the dataset.

6. Select study features:

Create Groups 

Allows researchers to provide different content/questions to participants based upon group membership (e.g., Assessment only vs. Assessment + Intervention).

Creating a New Group

1. Click the Groups tab.

2. Click the  Add button.

3. Name the Group by typing inside the Name textbox field; a brief description of the group can be added in the Description textbox.

4. Select features for the new group.

5. Click the Save button.

Always click the save button after you make changes to your study. You will lose all work that you do not save.

Open

Create Questions

Question types and how to create them:

1. In the Questions tab, click the New Question Template button.

2. Type a variable name into the Field Name textbox. This will be a labeled column in your dataset.

3. Choose a Question Type (e.g., radio, slider, check all that apply, time, calendar, date, etc.).

4. Check the Required button if you would like this question to be answered before participants can move to the next question. If unchecked, participants will be allowed to skip the item.

5. Type your Question Text. This text will appear on the smartphone screen during the assessment.

6. Enter instructions on how to complete the question in the Description textbox (e.g., “Slide your finger from left to right to answer this question”). (Optional)

7. To adjust Font Color and Font Weight of the question, click the add button under Settings (if you do not change the font color or weight, Insight default settings will be used).

8. Under Responses, click Add for each desired answer response. For example, click  Add 5 times for a 5-item Likert-Type scale (e.g., Strongly Agree, Agree, Neutral, Disagree, Strongly Disagree).

   1. Type each answer into the Text field as it should appear on the smartphone screen (e.g., Strongly Agree).

   2. Type a Value that corresponds to each answer response (e.g., “1” for Strongly Agree). These Values will appear in your dataset.

   3. Hover the mouse over the Move ↕ button, click, hold, and move items up and down to reorder responses. The order of the responses here will set the response order in the app.

   4. Click the Configure wheel next to each Response if you would like to change the Font Color and/or Font Weight for each answer response.

   5. Click the Remove  button to remove an answer response.

9. Click the Save button on the top right hand side of the screen, and always click the save button after you make changes to your study. You will lose all work that you do not save.

10. Insight allows you to clone Questions. This feature can save considerable amounts of time if your study contains similarly worded questions, or questions with similar/identical answer responses.

    1. From the Questions dashboard, click the Clone  button for a particular question.

    2. Change the Field Name for this new item.

    3. Change the Question Text.

    4. Modify answer Responses and Settings as needed.

    5. Save  the new item.

Create Assessments

This section explains how to create assessments.

1. Click the Assessments tab.

2. Click Add  to create a new Assessment.

3. Type a name for your assessment in the Assessment Name textbox.

1. Assessment Timeout Minutes allows studies to customize how long a specific assessment can be; when using Add/Edit/Clone Assessment operations, the Assessment Timeout Minutes is defaulted from the Study Level timeout duration.

1. Add questions to the assessment:

1. Question Feature Buttons on the right hand side of the screen will enable you to customize your Assessment.

1. Click the Save button.

1. Click Close to return to the Assessments tab where you will see your new assessment.

Create Stages

Insight conceptualizes Stages as periods of time. The Stage feature allows you to present different questions and intervention content and use different Insight features at different time points in your study. You can include as many stages as you like.

1. Click the Events tab.

2. Click Add to create a new Stage.

3. Type a name for your stage in the Name textbox. 

1. The Type dropdown box allows you to set how this stage will end.

1. Stage Settings 

1. Click the Save  button.

Create Events

Events are Assessments that are embedded within stages. There can be many events within a particular stage (e.g., Random Assessments, Fixed Assessments).

1. Select a stage for a new event.

2. Click  in the Events section of the stage to create a new Event.

3. Type a name for the new Event in the Schedule Name textbox (e.g., Pre-Quit Daily Diary-Control Group).

1. Select the particular group(s) that you would like to associate with this event under 

Available Groups and drag the group(s) into the Selected Groups box.

1. Click the Save button.

Configure Events

This section describes the Insight Event types and how to configure them.

Scheduling for Each Event Type

Configure Notifications (Optional)

Notifications are messages that are presented to participants during specific stages on specific dates/times.

1. Click the Notifications tab in CMS.

2. In the Schedule Field Name text box type a name for the Notification (e.g., “Day 1 Message”).

3. Select a Message Type.

1. Select the Group(s) that should get this notification. Then press . 

1. Messages section

1. Click the Save button.

Create and Configure Subject Payments (Optional)

This section provides instructions for setting up the optional payment button for your study. The payment button allows participants to review the history of prompted, completed surveys and the amount of credits earned thus far. To enable this option, click on the Custom Payments checkbox under Features in the Study tab and click Save .

Then click the Payments tab. Three folders will appear: Payment Schedules, Participation Calculation, and Payments. To open each folder, click the Open button to the right.

Payment Schedules

Follow the directions below to create criteria for subject payments.

• Open the Payment Schedules folder

• Click Add to add a new schedule

• Enter a name for your payment schedule in the Schedule Name textbox (see Figure 1)

• There are two payment Schedule Types: Default and Percent.

  • Default

    • This payment schedule type enables researchers to pay participants for completing a specific task in the app (e.g., completing a daily carbon monoxide test, completing a weekly EMA, completing a follow-up survey).

  • Percent

    • The percent schedule type is used to track the number of scheduled surveys that are prompted and completed by participants.

    • Fill in the 3 fields: Payment Name, Percent, and Amount

      • Payment Name will appear as text in this payment schedule.

        • Add Payment Names for each line in a payment schedule (see example below: 74% to 50%, 89% to 75%, 90% to 100%).

      • The Percent field is used to define requirements for the percentage of surveys that need to be completed for a specific level of payment (Note: enter .50 for 50%; see example in the payment screen below: 50%, 75%, and 90%). Note that the amount of current compensation is automatically populated for each participant based upon the percentage of EMAs complete up-to-the-moment.

      • The Amount field is used to define the amount of credit the participant will earn for completing a certain percentage of surveys.

    • Click Save once you have configured the payment schedule.

• You can add additional payment schedules (e.g., separate payments for different weeks of the study) to customize the payment button. Different schedules allow participants to earn different amounts for completing surveys at different points in the study (e.g., up to $20 for completing 5 EMAs per day during the first week of the study and up to $15 for completing 3 EMAs per day during the second week of the study).

Participation Calculation

The Participant Calculation section enables the researcher to tie specific payment schedules with specific study stages and EMA types. There are 3 types of Participation Calculation: Stage Based, Grouped Stages, and Custom Event Inclusion. Click the Edit button on the corresponding stage to view Events that can be included or excluded in each Participant Calculation. Note: Only events assigned to a specific stage can be selected, but you can tie one payment to many stages. For example, you can tie Payment 1 to Week 1, Week 2, and Week 3 stages. In this case, participants will be able to track their EMA completion and credit earned across Weeks 1-3. Alternatively, you can create separate Payment Schedules for Week 1, Week 2, and Week 3. All payment schedules will be displayed in the same Payment screen.

• Custom Event Inclusion

  • This option allows you to associate a payment schedule to specific events within and across stages. You can select which events you would like to count, or not count, towards a payment.

  • In the example below, Custom Event Inclusion is used to include only the Fixed Morning Daily Diary assessments in the Weeks 1-2 Payment calculation. None of the other interactions with the app (e.g., participant initiated EMAs) will be included in this payment calculation.

Payments (for Businelle/Kendzor studies only, used with Greenphire)

The Payments folder is used to track payments made to participant Greenphire MasterCards. The status (e.g., processing, pending, paid, failed) of each payment can be viewed in this section. Currently, this feature is only available to OUHSC researchers.

Payment Log Question Type

In order to make the Payment button appear on the Insight app home screen, you will need to do the following:

• Create a Payment Log question. To do this, select Payment Log under Question Type Dropdown. Under settings select Web View HTML.

• Contact the mHealth Support team to create a HTML file and Payment Log.

  • The types of Payment Logs mHealth has to offer:

    • PercentPaymentLog - Shows percentage of assessments completed vs total possible assessments taken per stage

    • FlatPaymentLog - Shows history of payments

    • FlatPaymentLogV2 - Shows history of payments. Includes Events that triggered each payment.

    • FlatPaymentWithQ - Shows history of payments. Includes Questions that triggered each payment

• Once that Payment Log is created, you will need to create a “Payment” Event with Payment Log as the assessment for each stage of your study.

Sensor Incorporation (Optional)

Create Study Permissions

This enables the researcher to give specific permissions to research staff.

1. Create User – This is only available to Insight staff. To create a new CMS (Content Management System) User, submit a ticket through Service Desk and include the individual(s) email address, approval from the PI, and the IRB approval letter that adds the user to that particular study. The individual(s) will receive an email from “donotreply-insight@insightmhealth.com” to create their CMS (Content Management System) login credentials (username; password).

1. Group Rights – This tab is used to define the rights (commonly referred to as “permissions”) of each type of Role within a study. The Researcher is responsible for assigning permissions to Role(s) within a study; therefore, Researchers have rights to view, edit, and delete all tabs within Insight. The Creating Role dropdown details the hierarchy of enabling permissions.

1. Study Users – Provides a list of all staff members on a study. Those designated as researchers can add a new CMS (Content Management System) User, delete users, assign or change the role(s) of all other staff members.

Test Your Study Settings

• Test EVERYTHING using multiple test participants on phones before your launch your study! This includes wording of questions, answer options, skip patterns, each assessment, stage changes, notifications, review data and ensure the data appear as expected. 

• Use phone administrative features to test your study. On the phone, swipe the screen from left to right. Click Log in. Enter your researcher user name and password. Swipe from left to right again and you will have access to the admin features including:

  • View Assessment Schedule – Shows events that are scheduled on the study phone.

  • Test Assessments – Allows you to test each of the assessments that you have created for your study. Face value assessment names enable you to know which assessments have been tested and which ones still need to be tested. Verify Assessment Timeout Minutes is correct on a Study or Assessment Level.

  • Log Out – Logs out of the administrator features.

  • Version Info – Contains the version of Insight that is running on the phone AND includes the participant ID number.

  • Additional Tabs (Do not click) – Process Payments, Reschedule Alarms, Unit Test, Reset Insight App

Download Encrypted Study Data

This allows the researcher to click the Reports tab to download encrypted study data (e.g., EMA data, GPS data) from the study server in CSV and/or Standard Excel formats.

Selecting “SPSS“ will generate an SPSS (.sav) file of the EMA Data Report.

Below is an EMA Pivoted Report Data Dictionary:

Create and Enroll Participants

All participants need to be using the latest version of the Insight app. To manually update the app, follow the instructions below:

1. On the phone, find Google Play Store and select it

2. Look for the “Search for apps & games” search bar → Select the three horizontal lines to the left

3. The screen will slide to the right → Select My apps and games

4. Find Insight mHealth Platform → Select Update

5. The Insight App will update → Scroll down to “Recently Updated” → Find Insight mHealth Platform and select Open

There are two ways to create and enroll new participants. The Code Method described below should be used in most circumstances.

1. The Code Method involves using the Insight CMS website to create a unique participant code and that code is used when the participant downloads the Insight app from the app store.

Select a Time Zone from the dropdown for the Participant, as shown below.

1. The Researcher Login Method can be used to enroll participants into studies. This method should be used in rare cases.

Wipe Data from Lost/Stolen Phones

We have developed a “kill switch” that deletes all data from the app when it is executed. Note: this feature requires that the phone is on and connected to a cellular network or Wi-Fi at the time the kill switch is executed. 

• Click Participant tab in CMS

• Click the Participant ID that you would like to wipe from a phone

• Click Wipe App

• Type the Participant ID into the text field

• Click Confirm Wipe

Participant Dashboard Settings and Features

These features allow you to add appointments to the home screen of the app, edit participants (e.g., wake & sleep times), and monitor participant use of the Insight app features. This tab enables you to display Insight app activities and interactions for each participant. Rows indicate specific events that the app has recorded (e.g., assessments, phone power offs, app syncs, event dismissed).

• Activity Tab: the following details the top row of a participant’s Activity log

  • Date: MM/DD/YY and time (displayed in military time) of the Assessment scheduled.

  • Stage: where the participant is currently in the study.

  • Type: what type of Assessment is scheduled.

    • For instance, Fixed, Random, Participant Initiated, or Follow Up.

  • Name: what the assessment is labeled

    • For example, “Post-Quit Daily Evening, Morning EMA” etc.

    • Use assessment names that are easy to differentiate

  • Snoozed Minutes: the number of minutes an assessment was delayed

    • The participant has to actively press “Snooze” when an assessment is prompted. This will delay the assessment to a potentially better time for the participant.

  • Scheduled: what time an Assessment is scheduled in the CMS according to the Assessment settings.

  • Notified: when the phone notifies a participant of the Assessment by ringing/vibrating.

    • The requested notification time is typically honored by the phone operating system, but can vary depending on the priorities established by the internal operating system. Generally, this time correlates to the scheduled time but may vary by 5-10 minutes. In extreme cases, (again determined by the operating system) this may be longer.

    • The volume is dependent on each individuals notification settings; Insight does not regulate this. If a phone is set to silent, then no sound will be heard at the time the assessment is notifying.

  • Started: the time the participant begins the Assessment

  • Completed: the time the participant ended the Assessment

• Responses: how many questions were answered by the participant during the Assessment.

Example of a participant’s Activity tab for the assessment ‘Post-Quit Daily Morning (QG)’

• The Activity tab includes the following information/settings/options:

  • Start date – this is the day the app was initiated for this participant.

  • Last completed sync – this is the date and time of the most recent sync between the participant’s phone and the server

  • Modify the period of activities displayed on this page by clicking and changing the Start Date and End Date fields. Click Refresh to update the Activity screen.

  • Click More Filters to add or remove activities that are displayed on this page.

  • Click Sync to manually sync the phone using the CMS (if the phone is on and connected it will be synced to the server).

  • Click Ping to send a signal to the participant’s phone to see if the phone is on and connected to a WiFi or data network.

    • If the phone is on, connected to a WiFi or data network a green ‘Data Sync Complete’ log will appear minutes later in the participant’s Activity tab.

  • Click Wipe App to wipe data from lost or stolen phones.

  • Time Zone can be toggled to display activities using the researcher’s time zone, the participant’s local time zone, or UTC time (Coordinated Universal Time).

  • Event Dismissed: when an “Event alt ID ##### Dismissed” log appears before or after an assessment.

    1. An 'Event alt ID ###' log will only appear in the Activity tab when a participant has actively dismissed an assessment; this indicates they clicked “dismiss” when an assessment(s) was notified by ringing/vibrating.

       1. If the participant allows the assessment to ring/vibrate without any intervention, there will not be an ‘Event Alt ID ### Dismissed' entry in the Activity tab.

    Event Dismissed Example

  • Syncing: each participant's phone will randomly sync four (4) times in a twenty-four (24) hour time frame.*

    • *Syncing data from the phone requires the phone to be on, connected to WiFi or a data network.

    • If a participant is not syncing for a day or more, it can be speculated the phone is off/shut down, in airplane mode, not connected to WiFi or a cellular service. It is recommended to reach out to the participant for clarification.

• Information tab – View/edit participant information (e.g., name date of birth), and write notes about the participant.

• Contact – View/edit participant contact information (e.g., address, phone number).

• Appointments – Create appointment reminders for each participant. This reminder will appear at the top of the app home screen.

  • Click Add Appointment.

  • In the Date field, use the calendar to select the date of the appointment.

  • In the hh and mm fields, select the specific hour and minute for the appointment.

  • Select AM or PM

  • If the visit will be compensated, type the amount in the Compensation field.

  • If desired, type a short message in the Message field (e.g., Week 4 Follow-up Visit).

  • Click Add Recurring Appointment to create a recurring appointment (e.g., weekly, monthly).

  • Click Show Old Appointments to view appointments that have already passed.

• Stages – View a summary of activities that the participant completed in each stage of the study.

• Schedule – View/edit the participant’s Wake, Sleep, and Preferred Assessment time. Note: Changes made to these settings will not go into effect until a stage change occurs or a stage is reset by clicking the Reset button. Instructions are displayed on the Troubleshooting Wiki labeled Changing Participants Sleep Schedule.

• Settings – View/edit settings (e.g., iCO pin number, Greenphire credit card number).

• Payments 

  • Percent Participation – View calculated percentage of all paid assessments completed within each stage

  • Send Greenphire Payment – Click Send Manual Payment to automatically transfer money to the participant’s Greenphire Master Card.

  • Payments – View a history of all payments and status of all payments to the participant (e.g., processing, paid).

• Facial Recognition – View actual pictures taken and algorithm derived facial match percentages during the facial recognition process.