Smartphone-based interventions for employees' well-being promotion: a systematic review

Abstract

Occupational Psychology faces challenges concerning the promotion of employees' well-being and health. The use of emergent technologies (e.g. smartphone) has revealed new opportunities to deliver effective, cheap and early interventions. By following the international PRISMA statement guidelines, this systematic review aims to bring together workplace smartphone-based interventions, targeting employees' well-being and psycho-physical health, to address the lack of studies focused on workplace settings. Results were drawn from 31 quantitative and qualitative studies, testing smartphone applications. The authors extracted multiple information for each article: focus, target, theoretical background, users' engagement and study design. Findings show the lack of theoretical background, reliable study design and the prevalence of physical health interventions. Moreover, our review identifies the importance of users' engagement for an intervention's effectiveness. It is relevant to design specific mHealth interventions, to provide employees with the skills to cope with and manage work-stress and enhance their general health and well-being.