Design
Participants consented to take part in a study of ‘how effective internet and telephone-based resources are in helping smokers quit’ that involved completing a brief questionnaire at the time and two follow-up surveys 1 and 7 months later. They were also told that they might be given suggestions about resources to use. Thus, we avoided creating expectancies regarding receipt of any particular intervention or that the control group was missing out on anything by not mentioning specific interventions at recruitment, thus providing an unbiased estimate of effect that controls for rate of uptake. Randomization was via a random number generator embedded within the baseline survey. The four intervention conditions were: (i) QuitCoach only (n = 809); (ii) onQ only (n = 756); (iii) both as an integrated package (integrated) (n = 785); and (iv) a choice of all three above (choice condition) (n = 758). A minimal treatment control group (n = 422: allocated at half the rate of the other conditions) was given brief information on web- and telephone-based assistance available in Australia (http://www.quitnow.org.au and the Quitline number). This represents a modification of a 2 ฅ 2 design (see Table 1), with two groups offered both,
but in different ways. At the completion of the baseline survey, participants were offered the opportunity to use the intervention to which they were allocated, but there was no obligation or pressure to use. The interventions all encouraged concurrent use of stop-smoking medication where appropriate, and did not attempt to restrict use of other forms of help. Effect of automated quit smoking programs 619