Acceptability and feasibility of smartphone-assisted 24 h recalls in the Chinese population

OBJECTIVE: To examine the acceptability and feasibility of using smartphone technology to assess beverage intake and evaluate whether the feasibility of smartphone use is greater among key sub-populations. DESIGN: An acceptability and feasibility study of recording the video dietary record, the acceptability of the ecological momentary assessment (EMA), wearing smartphones and whether the videos helped participants recall intake after a cross-over validation study. SETTING: Rural and urban area in Shanghai, China. SUBJECTS: Healthy adults (n 110) aged 20-40 years old. RESULTS: Most participants reported that the phone was acceptable in most aspects, including that videos were easy to use (70%), helped with recalls (77%), EMA reminders helped them record intake (75%) and apps were easy to understand (85%). However, 49% of the participants reported that they had trouble remembering to take videos of the beverages before consumption or 46% felt embarrassed taking videos in front of others. Moreover, 72% reported that the EMA reminders affected their consumption. When assessing overall acceptability of using smartphones, 72% of the participants were favourable responders. There were no statistically significant differences in overall acceptability for overweight v. normal-weight participants or for rural v. urban residents. However, we did find that the overall acceptability was higher for males (81%) than females (61%, P=0·017). CONCLUSIONS: Our study did not find smartphone technology helped with dietary assessments in a Chinese population. However, simpler approaches, such as using photographs instead of videos, may be more feasible for enhancing 24 h dietary recalls.