Josée Poirier

Journal of Medical Internet Research - International Scientific Journal for Medical Research, Information and Communication on the Internet

Rigorous evaluation of eHealth interventions is acutely needed but can be challenging to execute in a cost-and time-efficient way. The purpose of this study is to describe a randomized controlled trial carried out as part of an approach that evaluates and informs product development throughout an intervention's life cycle. We present the methodological case of a pragmatic randomized controlled trial evaluating the effectiveness of the web-based intervention “Daily Challenge.” We conducted the trial entirely online and leveraged existing resources to implement it quickly and within budget. One thousand five hundred three participants were recruited in 49 days (17.1 % of candidates assessed for eligibility). Then, 68.7 % of participants were reached for follow-up at 30 days and 62.5 % at 90 days. Data collection (baseline to 90-day follow-up) was completed within 5 months. Rigorous trials can be conducted efficiently and in a timely manner, enabling evaluation on a continuous basis. Development should include ongoing empirical input to inform product iterations.

Parallelism effects refer to the facilitated processing of a target structure when it follows a similar, parallel structure. In coordination, a parallelism-related conjunction triggers the expectation that a second conjunct with the same structure as the first conjunct should occur. It has been proposed that parallelism effects reflect the use of the first structure as a template that guides the processing of the second. In this study, we examined the role of parallelism in real-time anaphora resolution by charting activation patterns in coordinated constructions containing anaphora, Verb-Phrase Ellipsis (VPE) and Noun-Phrase Traces (NP-traces). Specifically, we hypothesised that an expectation of parallelism would incite the parser to assume a structure similar to the first conjunct in the second, anaphora-containing conjunct. The speculation of a similar structure would result in early postulation of covert anaphora. Experiment 1 confirms that following a parallelism-related conjunction, first-conjunct material is activated in the second conjunct. Experiment 2 reveals that an NP-trace in the second conjunct is posited immediately where licensed, which is earlier than previously reported in the literature. In light of our findings, we propose an intricate relation between structural expectations and anaphor resolution.

Social Influence as a Driver of Engagement in a Web-Based Health Intervention

Ellipsis refers to an element that is absent from the input but whose meaning can nonetheless be recovered from context. In this cross-modal priming study, we examined the online processing of Sluicing, an ellipsis whose antecedent is an entire clause: The handyman threw a book to the programmer but I don’t know which book the handyman threw to the programmer_ellipsis. To understand such an elliptical construction, the listener arguably must ‘fill in’ the missing material (“the handyman threw___ to the programmer”) based on that which occurs in the antecedent clause. We aimed to determine the point in time in which reconstruction of the sluiced sentence is attempted and whether such a complex antecedent is re-accessed by the ellipsis. Out of the two antecedent constituents for which we probed, only the Object (programmer) was found active in the elliptical clause, confirming that an antecedent is attributed to the sluice in real time. Possible reasons for the non-observation of the Subject (handyman) are considered. We also suggest that ellipses are detected earlier in coordinated than subordinated sentences.