Cell Phone-Based Expert Systems for Smoking Cessation

This project aims to enhance the emotional and physical well-being of veterans through the reduction of smoking by utilizing a web-based, computerized tailored intervention (CTI) with feedback messages delivered via cell phone. CTIs have shown increasing promise as useful behavior change programs for improved health behaviors. A variety of modalities are to deliver personalized CTI information and feedback; however, the ubiquity and sophistication of today's wireless mobile technologies represent new modes of delivery for empirically based smoking cessation and other behavioral health interventions. The CTI is based on the empirically-supported Transtheoretical Model of Behavior Change (TTM). A web-based CTI modified for a veteran population will be used to pilot test the effectiveness of the CTI alone and CTI plus individualized text messaging enhancements. The pilot study is a randomized controlled trial to assess the cell phone's feasibility as an intervention modality for changing smoking behaviors. This will be the first study to adapt a smoking cessation Internet-based CTI to provide personalized feedback on a cell phone to reduce smoking behaviors in military veterans.