Autism : the international journal of research and practice
June 1, 2024
Chad Stecher, Broc A Pagni, Sara Cloonan et al.
11 citations
Autistic adults face elevated depression risk, which harms daily functioning and life outcomes. App-based meditation helps neurotypical adults manage depression, but long-term evidence for autistic adults was lacking. Anchoring, a habit-formation strategy, had not been tested in this group. This work shows that combining anchoring with app-based meditation is feasible and effective for establishing meditation habits in autistic adults. These habits maintained reduced depressive symptoms over six months. The findings indicate anchoring-based habit formation is a promising technique for building healthy habits in autistic adults, and app-based meditation offers a durable self-care option for managing depression in this population.
JMIR research protocols
April 28, 2023
Chad Stecher, Sara Cloonan, Sebastian Linnemayr et al.
2 citations
Long-term elevated stress contributes to mental and physical health problems. Mindfulness meditation mobile apps offer a promising self-management tool, but poor adherence limits their effectiveness. This planned 16-week randomized controlled trial will test whether combining behavioral economics incentives (self-monitoring messages and financial rewards) with an anchoring strategy—pairing meditation with an existing daily routine—can establish and maintain a habit of at least 10 minutes of daily meditation. The study will compare five groups, varying the type of self-monitoring and whether financial incentives are tied to any-time meditation or meditation near the anchor time. Adherence will be measured weekly, and secondary outcomes include stress, anxiety, PTSD, sleep, and habit strength. The research aims to identify a scalable intervention for stress management.
Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland)
March 18, 2025
Rylan Fowers, Aurel Coza, Yunro Chung et al.
Temporal consistency in the time of day of meditation sessions is associated with long-term meditation app use for fewer than half of users. Among 4205 annual subscribers to a commercial meditation app, 39.5% showed consistent timing, 55.3% inconsistent timing, and 5.23% were indeterminate. Panel models confirmed that temporal consistency had contrasting relationships with meditation maintenance across these three groups. This suggests that other behavioral mechanisms besides temporally consistent habits can support sustained meditation app use, with implications for promoting maintenance of complex health behaviors like physical activity and diet.