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Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment

BACKGROUND: Conventional Web-based search engines may be unusable by individuals with low health literacy for finding health-related information, thus precluding their use by this population. OBJECTIVE: We describe a conversational search engine interface designed to allow individuals with low healt...

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Autores principales: Bickmore, Timothy W, Utami, Dina, Matsuyama, Robin, Paasche-Orlow, Michael K
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: JMIR Publications Inc. 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4717285/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26728964
http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/jmir.5239
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author Bickmore, Timothy W
Utami, Dina
Matsuyama, Robin
Paasche-Orlow, Michael K
author_facet Bickmore, Timothy W
Utami, Dina
Matsuyama, Robin
Paasche-Orlow, Michael K
author_sort Bickmore, Timothy W
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Conventional Web-based search engines may be unusable by individuals with low health literacy for finding health-related information, thus precluding their use by this population. OBJECTIVE: We describe a conversational search engine interface designed to allow individuals with low health and computer literacy identify and learn about clinical trials on the Internet. METHODS: A randomized trial involving 89 participants compared the conversational search engine interface (n=43) to the existing conventional keyword- and facet-based search engine interface (n=46) for the National Cancer Institute Clinical Trials database. Each participant performed 2 tasks: finding a clinical trial for themselves and finding a trial that met prespecified criteria. RESULTS: Results indicated that all participants were more satisfied with the conversational interface based on 7-point self-reported satisfaction ratings (task 1: mean 4.9, SD 1.8 vs mean 3.2, SD 1.8, P<.001; task 2: mean 4.8, SD 1.9 vs mean 3.2, SD 1.7, P<.001) compared to the conventional Web form-based interface. All participants also rated the trials they found as better meeting their search criteria, based on 7-point self-reported scales (task 1: mean 3.7, SD 1.6 vs mean 2.7, SD 1.8, P=.01; task 2: mean 4.8, SD 1.7 vs mean 3.4, SD 1.9, P<.01). Participants with low health literacy failed to find any trials that satisfied the prespecified criteria for task 2 using the conventional search engine interface, whereas 36% (5/14) were successful at this task using the conversational interface (P=.05). CONCLUSIONS: Conversational agents can be used to improve accessibility to Web-based searches in general and clinical trials in particular, and can help decrease recruitment bias against disadvantaged populations.
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spelling pubmed-47172852016-01-25 Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment Bickmore, Timothy W Utami, Dina Matsuyama, Robin Paasche-Orlow, Michael K J Med Internet Res Original Paper BACKGROUND: Conventional Web-based search engines may be unusable by individuals with low health literacy for finding health-related information, thus precluding their use by this population. OBJECTIVE: We describe a conversational search engine interface designed to allow individuals with low health and computer literacy identify and learn about clinical trials on the Internet. METHODS: A randomized trial involving 89 participants compared the conversational search engine interface (n=43) to the existing conventional keyword- and facet-based search engine interface (n=46) for the National Cancer Institute Clinical Trials database. Each participant performed 2 tasks: finding a clinical trial for themselves and finding a trial that met prespecified criteria. RESULTS: Results indicated that all participants were more satisfied with the conversational interface based on 7-point self-reported satisfaction ratings (task 1: mean 4.9, SD 1.8 vs mean 3.2, SD 1.8, P<.001; task 2: mean 4.8, SD 1.9 vs mean 3.2, SD 1.7, P<.001) compared to the conventional Web form-based interface. All participants also rated the trials they found as better meeting their search criteria, based on 7-point self-reported scales (task 1: mean 3.7, SD 1.6 vs mean 2.7, SD 1.8, P=.01; task 2: mean 4.8, SD 1.7 vs mean 3.4, SD 1.9, P<.01). Participants with low health literacy failed to find any trials that satisfied the prespecified criteria for task 2 using the conventional search engine interface, whereas 36% (5/14) were successful at this task using the conversational interface (P=.05). CONCLUSIONS: Conversational agents can be used to improve accessibility to Web-based searches in general and clinical trials in particular, and can help decrease recruitment bias against disadvantaged populations. JMIR Publications Inc. 2016-01-04 /pmc/articles/PMC4717285/ /pubmed/26728964 http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/jmir.5239 Text en ©Timothy W Bickmore, Dina Utami, Robin Matsuyama, Michael K Paasche-Orlow. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 04.01.2016. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication on http://www.jmir.org/, as well as this copyright and license information must be included.
spellingShingle Original Paper
Bickmore, Timothy W
Utami, Dina
Matsuyama, Robin
Paasche-Orlow, Michael K
Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment
title Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment
title_full Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment
title_fullStr Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment
title_full_unstemmed Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment
title_short Improving Access to Online Health Information With Conversational Agents: A Randomized Controlled Experiment
title_sort improving access to online health information with conversational agents: a randomized controlled experiment
topic Original Paper
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4717285/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26728964
http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/jmir.5239
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