Feasibility & acceptability of novel smoking cessation smartphone sensing app delivering support by realtime events

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Three million smokers try to stop smoking every year in the UK. However, most of these attempts fail. One of the main reasons for this is because smokers experience cues or triggers to smoke from their surroundings, such as seeing others smoke. Using a coping strategy can help smokers resist smoking or avoid these situations. However, smokers do not always use coping strategies effectively and most of those attempting to quit go back to smoking (relapse) within 4 weeks. The proposed research will explore a new way of helping smokers manage these types of situations using a smartphone app. One of the core features of this app is a smartphone sensing system. This system asks smokers to log information about each smoking episode before starting a quit attempt. Every time they do this the phone uses its in-built sensors (e.g. Global Positioning System, GPS) to record their location. Once they start their quit attempt, as well as receiving standard support, the app delivers advice and support when they approach or are positioned in the location of one of those past smoking episodes. We plan to assess the feasibility (does it do what it is meant to?) and acceptability (do smokers find this type of support helpful?) of this app using smokers in two studies. This will help us learn how we might improve the app and the way we study it in order to test it out in a larger study.