Using Engineering Methods during Intervention Design to Increase Participant Engagement: A Case Study

Developmental tasks such as developing identity and social connections are important for college adjustment, mental health, and retention (Azmitia et al., 2013; Buote et al., 2007; Côté, 2005; Côté, 2006; Hefner & Eisenberg, 2009; Morrow & Ackerman, 2012). The current intervention, Live It, aims to facilitate these important developmental tasks via targeted co-curricular experiences. Specifically, the intervention builds skills in self-reflection and communication. Live It is an online platform that can be used to curate custom co-curricular experiences, as well as a gift card that can be used exclusively at these experiences to ensure all students can participate. Live It experiences include local ethnic food restaurants, arts performances, yoga classes, and outdoor activities. All experiences are attached with a skill-building activity such as a self-reflection or guided conversation.

The time between intervention development and dissemination is typically about ten years, and interventions often lack high participant engagement (Balas & Boren, 2000; Miller & Shinn, 2005). Research in engineering design has optimized the product and service design process via strategies such as parallel prototyping, or the rapid creation and testing of multiple versions of a product or service. Parallel prototyping increases product satisfaction which has been linked to higher consumer adoption and increased return on investment (Anderson et al., 1994; Häggman et al., 2013; Neeley et al., 2013). Live It used rapid parallel prototyping as an innovative intervention development method prior to an efficacy trial. Six iterations of the Live It program took place in six different undergraduate courses over nine months. Quantitative and qualitative data will be presented; we outline only the primary conclusion of each iteration below.

Class 1: Students felt empowered by having a choice of several co-curricular experiences, and usually invited friends to the experience.

Class 2: The majority of students used social and communication skills during the intervention when implemented in a small classroom with high instructor involvement.

Class 3: The majority of students used social and communication skills, even when the intervention was implemented in a large class with little instructor involvement.

Class 4: Data collection is currently in process for this iteration.

Class 5: Students make social connections even without a guided conversation activity.   

Class 6: Students will upload their self-reflections on the Live It platform for feedback from instructors and classmates.

Conclusions will highlight parallel prototyping as a way to increase user engagement with intervention programs, thus improving scalability after RCT. Future directions include a large-scale RCT.