Abstract
Background Frequent car use contributes to health and environmental issues such as air pollution, climate change and obesity. Active and sustainable mobility (bike, walk, public transport, car sharing) may address these issues. Different strategies have been implemented in past research, involving hard levers, aimed at modifying the economical or geographical context (e.g., free public transport), and soft levers, aimed at modifying psychological processes (e.g., personalised transport advice). However, few studies have combined both hard and soft levers. In addition, few have used robust methodologies (e.g., randomised controlled trials), followed behavioural changes in the long-term, and been anchored in behaviour change theories. InterMob aims to address these limits by implementing a 24-month randomised controlled trial including hard and soft levers. The objectives of InterMob are to a) evaluate the effectiveness of an experimental arm versus an active controlled arm, and b) identify the processes of mobility change.
Methods Regular car users living in Grenoble (N = 300) will be recruited and randomised to one of the two arms. The experimental arm consists in a six-month intervention combining hard levers (free access to transport/bikes), and soft levers (e.g., personalised transport advice). The control arm consists in a six-month intervention aimed at raising awareness on air pollution and its health effects. Both arms will include eight evaluation weeks (spread out over 24 months) based on a GPS, an accelerometer, and a pollution sensor. Moreover, participants will complete mobility logbooks and surveys measuring psychological constructs, socio-economical, and socio-spatial characteristics.
Discussion InterMob will assess the effectiveness of two interventions aimed at reducing car use within regular car users in the short-, mid- and long-term. Moreover, InterMob will allow to better understand the psychological processes of behaviour change, and the socio-economical and geographical conditions under which the intervention is efficient in reducing car use. Finally, the benefits of mobility change in terms of physical activity, quality of life, and exposure to pollution will be quantified.
Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT05096000
Competing Interest Statement
Free public transport and free access to conventional or electric bicycles will be financed by Grenoble-Alpes Metropole, SMMAG and Region Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes that are key players in mobility, health, and environmental issues.
Clinical Trial
NCT05096000
Funding Statement
Intermob study is supported by the French National Research Agency in the framework of the Investissement d avenir IDEX programme (ANR-15-IDEX-02) for the Mobil Air research program. It also received support from the funding partners of the IResP (Institute for public health research) in the framework of the 2018 General call for projects - Prevention and Health Promotion strand (LI-CHALABAEV-AAP18-PREV-002), the Ambition Research Pack 2019 of the Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes Region, the SMAAG and, the Grenoble-Alpes Metropole. The funding sources had no role in determining the design nor the execution, analysis, or interpretation of the data.
Author Declarations
I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained.
Yes
The details of the IRB/oversight body that provided approval or exemption for the research described are given below:
InterMob study received the ethics approval from Grenoble Alpes Research Ethics Committee (CERGA) in January 2019 (File CER Grenoble Alpes-Avis-2019-01-29-2.
I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals.
Yes
I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance).
Yes
I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable.
Yes
Footnotes
Please cite as: Teran-Escobar, C., Duché, S., Bouscasse, H., Isoard-Gatheur, S., Juen, P., Lacoste, L., Lyon-Caen, S., Mathy, S., Ployon, E., Risch, A., Sarrazin, P., Slama, R., Tabaka, K., Treibich, C., Chardonnel, S., & Chalabaev A. InterMob: A 24-month randomised controlled trial comparing the effectiveness of an intervention including behavioural change techniques and free transport versus an intervention including air pollution awareness-raising on car use reduction among regular car users living in Grenoble, France. MedRχiv. https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.07.21.22277902
↵† CTE is now at Univ. Grenoble-Alpes, CNRS, IRD, Grenoble INP, IGE, 38000 Grenoble, France.
More details on the logic behind the development of the control group content. New sections: Data monitoring, potential harms and auditing Protocol version and protocol amendments Acknowledgments Dissemination policy New document in supplemental files : checklist SPIRIT guidelines Supplemental files updated
Data Availability
The anonymized and aggregated dataset and the codes used to analyse data will be available after the end of the data analysis in the open science framework:
https://osf.io/9anpg/?view_only=240b64a24554468dbc4b5025aca18824
4. List of Abbreviations
- GPS
- Global Positioning System