Last update: April 9, 2024
Saturday, May 18 – Workshop Sessions
WORKSHOP 1: Embedding the routine use of ontologies to promote best use of evidence in behavioural science
Morning Session – Susan Michie, PhD (UK), Robert West, PhD (UK), and Marta Marques, PhD (Portugal)
‘Ontologies’ are formal systems for representing information that provide greater consistency, clarity and coherence than natural language. They are increasingly used in sciences, notably the Gene Ontology, that has unified molecular biology, and the Good Relations ontology which is used to classify products for online shopping. Constructs are linked to classes with formal definitions and are given unique IDs and labels that are searchable on the internet. Then anyone wanting to use the construct can make it clear precisely what class they are referring to in documents and databases simply by citing the IDs.
The Behaviour Change Intervention Ontology (BCIO) and related ontologies are now ready for use by researchers. They describe behaviours, behavioural interventions, target populations, settings, mechanisms of action and other information needed to fully specify information in study protocols, reports and databases. This workshop will provide hands-on experience and guidance in using these ontologies. This includes: 1) finding ontology classes that one wishes to use, 2) understanding how different classes relate to each other, 3) using the IDs for these classes in documents and databases, and 4) making proposals for new classes.
The workshop will introduce the behavioural science ontologies, familiarise participants with the structure of these ontologies and how to search them to find classes for the constructs they are interested in, and guide attendees through the process of finding and citing ontology classes in their documents with practical examples.
IMPORTANT: Attendees are encouraged to bring their laptops to this session.
Preconference activity
It is recommended to
- Look at the papers summarising the upper level of the BCIO and the Behaviour Change Technique Ontology
- Visit and explore the BCIO website. This includes an introduction to ontologies and the BCIO as well as links to brief training videos.
WORKSHOP 2: Using the ORBIT Model for Research on Complex Behavioral Interventions
Morning Session – Lynda Powell, PhD (USA), Kenneth Freedland, PhD (USA), and Susan Czajkowski, PhD (USA)
ORBIT is a widely-used translational research model that is designed to guide the development, refinement, and testing of health-related behavioral and psychosocial interventions. This workshop will show how the ORBIT model can be applied to multi-component, multi-level, and stepwise interventions. We will first examine the evolution of questions about complex interventions that are addressed as research on an intervention advances through the phases of the ORBIT model, and then take a closer look at early-phase intervention development, refinement, and proof-of-concept testing. The final presentation will examine how ORBIT can be used to organize research on stepped care algorithms for sequencing multiple interventions.
(1) How Complex Interventions Fit Into the ORBIT Model (Susan Czajkowski)
(2) Early-Phase Research on Complex Interventions (Lynda Powell)
(3) Development and Testing of Stepped Care Algorithms (Kenneth Freedland)
Recommended pre-readings (4 articles)
WORKSHOP 3: Co-creation and intervention adaptation for implementation in LMICs
Morning Session – Mariantonia Lemos, PhD (Colombia), Laura Maria Cebellos (Nurse practitioner, Colombia) and Maria Del Pilar Guevera Gonzalez (Journalist, Colombia)
This workshop will be focused in exemplifying the adaptation of behavioural interventions to a LMIC (lower and middle-income country) context through the work with communities, stakeholder leaders and local experts in order to overcome structural and individual barriers that are usually found in the adaptation process. We will provide some materials taken from two projects that are currently working on adapting interventions in Colombia as a way to organise the workshop and show the importance of the co-creation sessions in this process. In both cases, the co-creation aspect has proven to be crucial in enriching the communication between the researchers and the communities, as well as providing insights to the projects as well as the researchers in their approach to implementation sciences.
WORKSHOP 4: Publish and Flourish – Effective and Efficient Knowledge Transfer
Morning Session – Linda Pagani, PhD (Canada)
Offered in French – If you are planning on a promising career as an academic and social policy influencer, you are faced with the challenge of advancing in an “impact factor” world. This starts with effectively and efficiently writing papers and grants. This workshop is about the essentials of paper production, from start to finish, including how to produce a generic title page, a cover letter to help get the paper reviewed, and how to avoid common errors and pitfalls.
- Structured and unstructured abstracts for meetings
- Manuscripts for observational/nonexperimental, experimental, and qualitative studies
- AMA and APA formats
- Relationship between policy and research
- Cover letters, submissions and resubmissions
- Press releases and embargoes
- Writing in English as a second language
WORKSHOP 5: Enhancing Impact of Behavioral Medicine Through Systems Thinking – Guided Coordination of Evidence Production & Information Flow: A Co-Design Workshop
Afternoon Session – Eric Hekler, PhD (USA) with Pedja Klasnja, PhD (USA)
There is increased work within the field of Behavioral Medicine focused on articulating how we can work together to produce real-world impact. Using principles of systems thinking, Drs. Eric Hekler and Predrag (Pedja) Klasnja will propose two frameworks in this design workshop to contribute towards more coordinated information flow and evidence production across the field of Behavioral Medicine. The goal of the first is to offer a map of the flow of information and knowledge across the field of Behavioral Medicine. Specifically, the framework maps out the inter-connected and inter-dependent goals of the field (i.e., concept creation, intervention/solution creation, problem-oriented practice, strengths-cultivation-oriented practice, rigorous quality improvement, single-sector collective action, and multi-sector collective action) and then offers proposed “pipelines” of evidence production for each goal, drawing from prior models (e.g., ORBIT would fit in as the “intervention creation” pipeline). The goal of the second framework is to offer guidance on the selection of appropriate methods, accounting for both the primary goal of the work (i.e., the key goals outlined in the first figure) and the fundamental attributes of the focal phenomenon. This will be a design workshop, which means that the goal is not to “teach the solution” to participants of the workshop about information flow and evidence production. Instead, the goal of this design workshop is to offer these two frameworks of information flow and evidence production as prototypes that can spur on the co-design of approaches for the effective coordination of evidence production and information flow. The hope is that this design workshop will help to seed a White Paper that helps to guide the field of Behavioral Medicine’s approach to effective evidence production, information flow, and resource flow locally, nationally, and globally, as a concrete way to improve our collective impact. This workshop is particularly appropriate for anyone interested in contributing to the development of such a white paper, which, after proper vetting, will feasibly be endorsed by the Behavioral Medicine Research Council (a group tasked with organizing activities across the inter-related societies relevant to Behavioral Medicine).
WORKSHOP 6: Designing for Scale: Strategies for interventions that can help more people in more ways
Afternoon Session – Celia Laur, PhD (Canada) with Zeenat Ladak, PhD(c) (Canada)
Many implementation theories, models and frameworks acknowledge the importance of planning for sustainability, spread and scale. However, these topics are typically only considered near the end of a project. This workshop will focus on practical tips and strategies, including an introduction to planning tools, questions to consider, and case examples to support you to plan for sustainability, spread and scale from early in the intervention development process. This workshop is an introduction and no prior experience with spreading or scaling is needed.
WORKSHOP 7: Rapid prototyping for digital behavioural interventions
Afternoon Session – Alex Tarling, MSc (UK)
There are a wide range of cheap, easy to use tools for making interactive websites and applications, and these can be used to rapidly prototype digital behavioural interventions, with no coding required. This workshop will explore why you might want to create and test elements of your intervention in the early stages, including what kind of questions you can ask and answer using a simple prototype and some low-cost user-testing. This will be a practical session – we will play in small teams to create and test an interactive prototype, using a no-code online tool.
IMPORTANT: Bring a wifi-enabled laptop or tablet.