Vijay Nair ^1*, Victor Strecher ¹, Angela Fagerlin ¹, Peter Ubel ¹, Kenneth Resnicow ¹, Susan Murphy ¹, Roderick Little ¹, Bibhas Chakraborty ¹, Aijun Zhang ¹

¹ University of Michigan

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: vnn{at}umich.edu.

	Abstract

Health behavior intervention studies have focused primarily on comparing new programs and existing programs via randomized controlled trials. However, numbers of possible components (factors) are increasing dramatically as a result of developments in science and technology (e.g., Web-based surveys). These changes dictate the need for alternative methods that can screen and quickly identify a large set of potentially important treatment components.

We have developed and implemented a multiphase experimentation strategy for accomplishing this goal. We describe the screening phase of this strategy and the use of fractional factorial designs (FFDs) in studying several components economically. We then use 2 ongoing behavioral intervention projects to illustrate their usefulness. FFDs are supplemented with follow-up experiments in the refining phase, so any critical assumptions about interactions can be verified.

Key Words: Cancer, Chronic Disease, Surveys, Statistics/Evaluation/Research, Women's Health

This article has been cited by other articles:

				L. M Collins, B. Chakraborty, S. A Murphy, and V. Strecher Comparison of a phased experimental approach and a single randomized clinical trial for developing multicomponent behavioral interventions Clinical Trials, February 1, 2009; 6(1): 5 - 15. [Abstract] [PDF]