Assessing digital support for smoking cessation

Abstract

Tobacco still kills more than 7 million people each year. Research points to several evidence-based interventions to support smoking cessation which, if applied widely, could considerably reduce premature deaths. There is a huge range of mobile apps targeting this concern, which could potentially be powerful catalysts to provide this support. Yet it is unclear how much of their design is evidence-based and how effective they are. To address this issue, this paper provides an analysis of 99 popular smoking cessation apps. The results show that only two apps come from a credible source, provide support for user engagement through advanced motivational affordances and have been evaluated for efficacy.