15:45 - 17:15
Tue-P1
Room: Waalsprong 4
Motivating long-term engagement: insights from a 30-day chemosensory tracking study on COVID-19 awareness
Tue-P1-034
Presented by: Maria Geraldine Veldhuizen
Maria Geraldine Veldhuizen 1, Parvaneh Parvin 2, Robert Pellegrino 3, Nicola Pirastu 4, Paule Joseph 5, Richard Höchenberger 6, Kathrin Ohla 6, Global Consortium of Chemosensory Research group author 1
1 Mersin University, Türkiye, 2 Wageningen University and Research, Netherlands, 3 Monell Chemical Senses Center, USA, 4 Human Technopole, Italy, 5 National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, USA, 6 DSM-Firmenich, Switzerland
The longitudinal tracking of odor intensity ratings for household items can predict COVID-19 infection (Iravani et al 2022). The Global Consortium of Chemosensory Research developed a web-based interface application to collect chemosensory ratings of a single stimulus, namely a daily consumed beverage, which can be repeatedly assessed over time. The primary objective of the study was to encourage the general public to complete a 30-day tracking period in order to raise awareness of chemosensory perception. This study consisted of a large convenience sample of 7551 participants (5268 women, 2190 men, 26 non-binary, 62 prefer not to say), on average 42 years old (+/- standard deviation 15), mostly from Europe (n=6736). Across all participants (pp), the median number of sessions completed was 1, with an average of 1.84 sessions (± sd 4.35). The distribution of completed sessions was strongly skewed with 6,481 pp completing only one session and 44 pp completing 30+ sessions. During a session, a pp sampled a beverage and then rated smell, sweetness, bitterness and sourness intensity as well as nasal patency. 4826 pp had a covid diagnosis during 1+ sessions. 4917 pp sampled coffee, 1560 tea, 618 juice and 456 another item. Many pp experienced chemosensory symptoms during the first session. Our analysis will focus on the subset of pp who completed 3+ sessions (n = 616), examining the patterns of app usage (including regularity, consecutive days) and other variables (item choice, chemosensory symptoms, and demographics) that predict 30-day completion. Furthermore, we will explore the variability in ratings based on chemosensory symptoms. We conclude that participants are rarely motivated to continue app usage beyond one session, a critical factor that future longitudinal studies need to address. However, participants may still continue to be aware of chemosensory symptoms in a more structured manner than before app usage, which can be directly assessed in future studies.