
pmid: 39112740
pmc: PMC11525430
AbstractPassive smartphone measures hold significant potential and are increasingly employed in psychological and biomedical research to capture an individual's behavior. These measures involve the near-continuous and unobtrusive collection of data from smartphones without requiring active input from participants. For example, GPS sensors are used to determine the (social) context of a person, and accelerometers to measure movement. However, utilizing passive smartphone measures presents methodological challenges during data collection and analysis. Researchers must make multiple decisions when working with such measures, which can result in different conclusions. Unfortunately, the transparency of these decision-making processes is often lacking. The implementation of open science practices is only beginning to emerge in digital phenotyping studies and varies widely across studies. Well-intentioned researchers may fail to report on some decisions due to the variety of choices that must be made. To address this issue and enhance reproducibility in digital phenotyping studies, we propose the adoption of preregistration as a way forward. Although there have been some attempts to preregister digital phenotyping studies, a template for registering such studies is currently missing. This could be problematic due to the high level of complexity that requires a well-structured template. Therefore, our objective was to develop a preregistration template that is easy to use and understandable for researchers. Additionally, we explain this template and provide resources to assist researchers in making informed decisions regarding data collection, cleaning, and analysis. Overall, we aim to make researchers' choices explicit, enhance transparency, and elevate the standards for studies utilizing passive smartphone measures.
1702 Cognitive Sciences, Mobile sensing, Social Sciences, Digital phenotyping, Original Manuscript, Transparency, Smartphone; Humans; Research Design; Reproducibility of Results; Data Collection/methods; Data Collection/instrumentation; Ambulatory assessment; Digital phenotyping; Mobile sensing; Open science; Preregistration; Reproducibility; Transparency, Experimental Psychopathology and Treatment, Psychology, Mathematical, TRIPOD, 0801 Artificial Intelligence and Image Processing, Psychology, Humans, Psychology, Experimental, Data Collection, Reproducibility of Results, Experimental Psychology, Preregistration, SCIENCE, Ambulatory assessment, Reproducibility, TRANSPARENT, 4905 Statistics, 1701 Psychology, 5202 Biological psychology, Research Design, REGISTRATION, 5204 Cognitive and computational psychology, Open science, Smartphone
1702 Cognitive Sciences, Mobile sensing, Social Sciences, Digital phenotyping, Original Manuscript, Transparency, Smartphone; Humans; Research Design; Reproducibility of Results; Data Collection/methods; Data Collection/instrumentation; Ambulatory assessment; Digital phenotyping; Mobile sensing; Open science; Preregistration; Reproducibility; Transparency, Experimental Psychopathology and Treatment, Psychology, Mathematical, TRIPOD, 0801 Artificial Intelligence and Image Processing, Psychology, Humans, Psychology, Experimental, Data Collection, Reproducibility of Results, Experimental Psychology, Preregistration, SCIENCE, Ambulatory assessment, Reproducibility, TRANSPARENT, 4905 Statistics, 1701 Psychology, 5202 Biological psychology, Research Design, REGISTRATION, 5204 Cognitive and computational psychology, Open science, Smartphone
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