ArticleFrontiers in psychology2021
Engagement in Digital Mental Health Interventions: Can Monetary Incentives Help?
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
11 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 21 citations in OpenAlex.
- User Experiences of and Preferences for Self-Guided Digital Interventions for the Treatment of Mild to Moderate Eating Disorders: Systematic Review and Metasynthesis.JMIR mental health · 2025Pooled it
- Attrition in Conversational Agent-Delivered Mental Health Interventions: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Pooled it
- Association Between Behavioral Phenotypes and Paid Subscription and Renewal Among New mHealth App Users: Six-Month Prospective Cohort Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Article
- Evaluating effectiveness and engagement strategies for asynchronous, messaging, trauma-focused therapy for posttraumatic stress disorder: Study design and methodology for a hybrid effectiveness-implementation randomized controlled trial.Contemporary clinical trials · 2026Article
- Engagement and attrition in digital mental health: current challenges and potential solutions.NPJ digital medicine · 2025Article
- Incentivising participation in mental health app research: lessons learned from a mixed methods randomised controlled trial.BJPsych open · 2025Article
- N-of-1 health optimization: Digital monitoring of biomarker dynamics to gamify adherence to metabolic switching.PNAS nexus · 2024Article
- Developing Message Strategies to Engage Racial and Ethnic Minority Groups in Digital Oral Self-Care Interventions: Participatory Co-Design Approach.JMIR formative research · 2023Article
- The engagement problem: A review of engagement with digital mental health interventions and recommendations for a path forward.Current treatment options in psychiatry · 2023Article
- Benefits of Digital Mental Health Care Interventions for Correctional Workers and Other Public Safety Personnel: A Narrative Review.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2022Review
- Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Digital mental health interventions (DMHI) are scalable and cost-effective strategies for increasing access to mental health care; however, dropout rates associated with digital interventions are high, particularly for open-access digital interventions. While some studies have focused on predictors of dropout from digital mental health programs, few studies have focused on engagement features that might improve engagement. In this perspective article, we discuss whether monetary incentives (MI) are one avenue to increasing user engagement in DMHI. We begin by reviewing the literature on the effects of MI for behavior change in health domains (e.g., dietary behaviors, substance use, and medication adherence). Then, drawing on a pilot study we conducted to test the effects of different levels of MI on usage and improvement in subjective well-being among users of a DMHI (Happify), we discuss the potential applications of MI for DMHI, the potential drawbacks of financial incentives in this context, and open questions for future research.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.