OBJECTIVES: Traditionally Discrete Choice Experiments (DCEs) have not been able to be easily completed on a mobile platform because of the size requirements of the choice scenarios and the relatively small mobile screen. This limitation presents a number of research challenges, particularly in regard to sampling certain age groups and cultures who prefer communication via a mobile device. The purpose of this study is to compare DCE results measuring community preferences towards genetic testing from different modes of survey completion (both mobile and computer).

METHODS: A representative sample of 500 Australians completed the survey. Participants were evenly split into two groups, a mobile group and a traditional computer group. The task involved trade-offs about the current and future offerings of genetic tests.In the mobile survey participants were shown a single profile task (i.e., one potential genetic test) and asked if they would choose to take this test given the features described. Similarly in the computer survey participants were shown a mix of both single profile tasks and the more commonly used multiple profile tasks (i.e., comparison of two potential genetic tests) and also asked about likely uptake.

RESULTS: There were no significant differences between the model results from the mobile survey and computer survey. The most important features to the Australian community when deciding whether to have a genetic test were the cost of the test, benefit of the test and the pre-existing chance that you will get the health condition of interest.

CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates that DCEs can be completed on a mobile platform and the results are comparable with results from traditional completion methods using a computer. These findings open up new research opportunities to interact and engage with participants who would otherwise not be able to or not be interested in completing a survey on a computer.