Mobile Apps for Preschool Parents (MAPP) Study

The target users of the CHEW app are parents/guardians of preschool aged children. The purpose of the CHEW app is to provide parents/guardians with easy, practical ways to improve nutrition and wellness among their preschool-aged children. The app provides guided goal setting and tracking tools. Parents/guardians set goals related to their preschool-aged children focused on nutrition, physical activity, sleep behaviors and parenting styles. The parents/guardians can also to set goals for themselves for behaviors related to nutrition, physical activity, sleep, and stress. The app does not have features that target children as users. The CHEW app was developed by the study team and can be downloaded for mobile devices (phones or tablets) at no cost in the Apple App Store (iOS/Apple) and the Google Play Store (Android). After downloading the CHEW app, enrolled participants must enter the Access Code provided by the study team in order to unlock the app and use it.

Beanstack is free commercially-available mobile app that provides goal setting and tracking tools similar to the CHEW app, but focused on a different topic, specifically encouraging parents/guardians to read to their preschool children more frequently. In the case that a parent/guardian is not able to successfully download Beanstack to their mobile device, as a backup alternative they will be asked to use a similar free commercially-available mobile application called Bookroo. Beanstack is available to the public for mobile devices (phones or tablets) at no cost in the Apple App Store (iOS/Apple) and the Google Play Store (Android). Bookroo is a web-based application that users access via the mobile device's web browser and looks and functions like a regular mobile application. It should work on any mobile device with a browser and data/wifi access,