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Causes And Consequences Of The Risk Of Generalizability Biases In Health Behavioral Interventions, Lauren Von Klinggraeff

Theses and Dissertations

Preliminary testing of health behavior interventions (e.g., pilot, feasibility studies) are used to evaluate intervention viability prior to additional testing and resource investment (e.g., larger trials). This initial testing provides valuable information, but promising estimates of effectiveness produced during early testing are rarely reproduced in larger studies, stalling the development of effective, scalable health interventions. In the obesity intervention literature, external validity biases, features of the intervention that are not (or cannot) transfer to the larger study, are associated with these diminished effects. These study features, such who delivers the intervention, the characteristics of the population receiving the intervention or …