Improving the Reach of Clinical Practice Guidelines: An Experimental Investigation of Message Framing on User Engagement. (September 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Werntz, Alexandra; Bufka, Lynn; Adams, Brian E.; Teachman, Bethany A.
• Is Part Of: Clinical psychological science. Volume 8:Number 5(2020)
• Page Start: 825
• Page End: 838
• Publication Date: 2020-09
• Subjects: posttraumatic stress disorder -- PTSD -- dissemination -- clinical practice guideline -- user engagement -- replication -- preregistered; Clinical psychology -- Periodicals; 616.89
• DOI: 10.1177/2167702620920722
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2167-7026

Abstract

Despite strong evidence for the efficacy of treatments for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), most affected individuals are not receiving these treatments, in part because they may not know that evidence-based treatments exist. The American Psychological Association published a website to disseminate information about its Clinical Practice Guideline for treating PTSD. In Study 1, Google Optimize was used in a field study to examine whether altering the subheadings to three of the website pages would increase site visitor engagement. On the main page and on the page with treatment descriptions, no subheading alterations improved engagement. On the Patients and Families page, the subheading "say goodbye to symptoms" improved engagement on three outcome variables, including clicking a link to find a psychologist (although there were a small number of clicks). In a preregistered conceptual replication in a sample not actively seeking information about the PTSD guideline ( N = 578), the results were not replicable. Results highlight challenges of disseminating information about evidence-based treatment.