IBTN Summer Schools Overview

Held yearly since 2018, the IBTN Summer School seeks to break through current obstacles in behavioural trial methodologies and expand the reach, capacity, and impact of trials in the field of behavioural medicine

Working with internationally renowned experts in innovative clinical trials, behavioural intervention development, and patient-oriented research, participants learn about developing effective behavioural interventions and conducting high-quality trials through interactive workshops and training activities. The IBTN Summer School is also designed to foster networking opportunities for its participants.

The Summer School has involved 57 individual faculty members from 10 different countries and now boasts of 147 alumni from across 20 countries. Nearly half of Summer School participants are doctoral students, with the rest equally divided among Masters students, postdoctoral fellows, professionals and early career investigators.

 

Summer School participants resoundingly reported a positive experience, with 99% enjoying the overall course experience, 97% appreciating the course materials as relevant and useful to their research, and 89% reporting that they learned “a lot”.

 

The best features of the Summer School program, as reported by participants include:

  • #1 – Collaborative activities
  • #2 – Knowledgeable, engaging, and approachable faculty
  • #3 – Social activities and networking opportunities
  • #4 – Content quality and relevance
  • #5 – Multidisciplinary and international scope
  • #6 – Program format and structure (interactive and informal)
  • #7 – Diversity of knowledge and perspectives
  • #8 – Opportunities for questions and discussion
  • #9 – Theoretical content and practical focus
  • #10 – Applied projects

The summer school is challenging and requires a lot of work, but it’s an opportunity to acquire and apply an enormous amount of highly relevant knowledge and to benefit from the perspectives of recognized researchers.

– Participant – 2023 edition

What I learned during the summer school has helped me develop a deeper level of critical thinking, more so than what I could have acquired at the bachelor’s level and arguably even at the doctoral level. The content delivered by the school should be required curriculum, especially for those pursuing research degrees.

– Participant – 2023 edition

Listen to former Summer School participants talk about the Summer School

 

Course themes have included:

  • Basic concepts and unique elements of behavioural trials
  • What makes behavioural interventions and trials unique and complex?
  • The clinically significant question and building implementation in from the start
  • How to appropriately develop a behavioural intervention, including the use of multiple research designs and the integration of stakeholders in the process
  • Stakeholder engagement and designing for implementation
  • The role of pilot and feasibility studies for your behavioural intervention
  • Intervention development models (ORBIT/SOBC)
  • Intervention development and stakeholder engagement
  • Matching your design to the question
  • The different kinds of evaluations that need to be conducted throughout the development and testing of your behavioural intervention
  • Feasibility and piloting
  • Evaluation – match your evaluation to the stage and design
  • Designing relevant behavioural Interventions for lower and middle-income countries
  • Implementation
  • The Behaviour Change Wheel
  • Behaviour Change Taxonomy
  • Aperçu des modèles de développement des interventions de population et individuelles
  • La « science fondamentale » des interventions :
  • Les déterminants sociaux de la santé
  • Recherches axées sur le patient
  • Moyens pour optimiser les interventions comportementales
  • Revues systématiques
  • Devis MOST
  • Interventions de population : considérations méthodologiques
  • Essais cliniques : considérations méthodologiques
  • Choix de mesures
  • Évaluation de la fidélité de l’intervention
  • Conceptions alternatives aux essais randomisés contrôlés
  • Devis SMART
  • Essais pragmatique
  • Diffusion de la recherche et mise en œuvre

 

View course outlines from previous editions: 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023

 

During each edition, participant groups generated a series of different projects, including:

2018 Edition

  1. Behavioural Intervention to Improve Primary Care Physicians’ Screening and Referral Rates to a Diabetes Prevention Programme
  2. Mobile vs. In-Person CBT in Adolescents with Depression
  3. Factorial design for Adoption of Knowledge to increase Exercise: The FAKE Trial
  4. Optimization of an m-Health intervention to prevent gestational diabetes in high-risk pregnant women with overweight and/or obesity
  5. Implementing enhanced audit and feedback: A cluster randomised controlled trial

2019 Edition

  1. Le développement d’une intervention pour la réduction de la consommation de cannabis chez les jeunes adolescents âgés entre 14-18 ans
  2. “La minute qui change tout” – Étude de faisabilité d’une intervention d’éducation sur les bienfaits de l’activité physique proposée aux professionnels de santé en oncologie sénologique
  3. Des interventions eHealth pour la réduction du temps d’écran passif afin de diminuer les symptômes dépressifs chez les adolescents: essai clinique randomisé contrôlé

2021 Edition

  1. Can physical exercise reduce psychological distress in hotel quarantine?
  2. Text2Vax: Is a Text-Based Intervention for COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy Feasible and Acceptable for Personal Support Workers?
  3. Promoting adherence to Canada’s 24-hour movement guidelines by 9-12 year old girls to reduce depressive symptomology in adolescence
  4. Physical activity intervention targeting sedentary adolescents with depression: A proof-of-concept study
  5. A SMS intervention to increase PrEP adherence among women in serodiscordant relationships (PAWS) in Uganda: A protocol for a optimization trial à
  6. Increasing COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake Among University Undergraduate Students
  7. Optimization of the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) to improve physical activity and diet among meat-packing warehouse employees at risk for type 2 diabetes
  8. mHealth for Mental Health in Adults: M & M

2022 Edition

  1. Body and mind intervention (behavioural weight management)
  2. A hybrid intervention to increase completion of cardiac rehabilitation in women: protocol for randomized controlled trial
  3. Increasing levels of physical activity among young adults with depression to decrease risk factors associated with type 2 diabetes mellitus: A feasibility study for an RCT
  4. Increasing HPV vaccine uptake in community within Ireland with low HPV vaccine rates
  5. A hybrid nutrition intervention for pregnant women in Canada
  6. Improving insomnia treatment in primary care settings

2023 Edition

  1. Intervention comportementale de soutien à l’arrêt du vapotage
  2. Protocole d’intervention : MB-EAT auprès des adolescents hyperphagiques
  3. Intervention de pleine conscience pour les adolescents présentant un TSA
  4. Adaptation du MB-EAT pour prévenir le diabète
Learn how to apply for the next edition

 

Summer School Core Faculty, Faculty, and Satellite Group Leaders

 

2018 2019 2021 2022 2023
Angela Alberga, PhD Concordia University, Canada Faculty Faculty Core Faculty and Satellite Lead Faculty
Silvina Arrossi, PhD National Institute of Science and Technology, Argentina Faculty
Simon Bacon, PhD Concordia University, Canada Faculty Faculty Faculty Faculty Faculty
Tracie Barnett, PhD INRS-Institut Armand Frappier, Canada Faculty Faculty
Ariane Bélanger-Gravel, PhD Université Laval, Canada Faculty Faculty
Jean Bourbeau, PhD McGill University, Canada Faculty
Claude-Julie Bourque, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty Faculty
David Buckeridge, PhD McGill University, Canada Faculty
Molly Byrne, PhD NUI Galway, Ireland Core Faculty Core Faculty and Satellite Lead Faculty
Tavis Campbell, PhD University of Calgary, Canada Core Faculty Satellite Lead
Linda Carlson, PhD University of Calgary, Canada Faculty Satellite Lead
Linda Collins, PhD Pennsylvania State University, USA Faculty
Susan Czajkowski, PhD National Cancer Institute, USA Core Faculty Core Faculty and Satellite Lead Faculty
Kaberi Dasgupta, MD, Msc McGill University, Canada Faculty
Karina Davidson, PhD Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons, USA Faculty
Declan Devane, PhD National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland Faculty
Sébastien Dewez, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty
Maureen Dobbins, PhD McMaster University, Canada Faculty
Ken Freedland, PhD Washington University, USA Faculty Faculty
Annick Gauthier Centre de médecine comportementale de Montréal, Canada Faculty
Lise Gauvin, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty Faculty
Jennifer Gordon, PhD University of Regina, Canada Satellite Lead
Vincent Gosselin Boucher, PhD University of British Columbia, Canada Satellite Lead Group Lead
Jeremy Grimshaw, MD, PhD University of Ottawa, Canada Faculty
Kate Guastaferro, PhD Pennsylvania State University, USA Core Faculty  and Satellite Lead Faculty
Robert Kaplan, PhD Stanford University, USA Faculty
Ian Kronish, MD Columbia University, USA Faculty
Catherine Laurin, PhD Montreal Behavioural Medicine Centre, Canada Faculty
Kim Lavoie, PhD Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada Core Faculty Faculty Core Faculty  and Satellite Lead Faculty Faculty
Rebecca Lee, PhD Arizona State University, USA Faculty
Mariantonia Lemos, PhD UEAFIT, Colombia Satellite Lead Satellite Lead
Audrey L’Espérance, PhD Centre d’excellence sur le partenariat avec les patients et le public, Canada Faculty
Sean Locke, PhD Brock University, Canada Satellite Lead
Marta Marques, PhD Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal Satellite Lead Faculty
Oonagh Meade, PhD National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland Satellite Lead Satellite Lead
Susan Michie, PhD University College London, UK Faculty
Paul Montgomery, PhD University of Birmingham, UK Core Faculty
Grégory Ninot, PhD Université de Montpellier, France Core Faculty Faculty Faculty
Chris Noone, PhD National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland Satellite Lead
David Ogez, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty
Linda Pagani, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty
Mark Parascandola, PhD, MPH Center for Global Health, US National Cancer Institute, USA Faculty
Sandra Peláez, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty
Lynda Powell, PhD Rush University, USA Faculty Faculty
Justin Presseau, PhD Ottawa University, Canada Core Faculty Faculty Faculty Faculty
María Fernanda Sedeño, BEng, MM RESPIPLUS, McGill University, Canada Faculty
Arash Shaban-Nejad, PhD University of California, Berkeley, USA Faculty
Sherri Sheinfeld-Gorin, PhD University of Michigan, USA Core Faculty  and Satellite Lead Faculty
Sharon Simpson, PhD University of Glasgow, Scotland Faculty
Sudha Sivaram, DrPH, MPH Center for Global Health, US National Cancer Institute, USA Faculty
Bonnie Spring, PhD Northwestern University, USA Faculty
Serge Sultan, PhD Université de Montréal, Canada Faculty Faculty
Michael Sykes, PhD Northumbria University, UK Satellite Lead Satellite Lead
K. Thankappan, PhD Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology, India Faculty
Elaine Toomey, PhD NUI Galway (2018), University of Limerick (2021), Ireland Faculty Faculty
Byron Wallace, PhD Northeastern University, USA Faculty
Robert West, PhD University College London, UK Faculty

SUMMER SCHOOL COMMITTEE AND ADMINISTRATIVE TEAM

Scientific Committee 2018 2019 2021 2022 2023
Simon Bacon ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Kim Lavoie ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Angela Alberga ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Tracie Barnett ✓ ✓
Ariane Bélanger-Gravel ✓ ✓
Molly Byrne ✓ ✓ ✓
Tavis Campbell ✓
Marilou Côté ✓
Susan Czajkowski ✓ ✓ ✓
Kaberi Dasgupta ✓
Frédérique Deslauriers ✓ ✓
Lise Gauvin ✓
Jennifer Gordon ✓
Vincent Gosselin Boucher ✓ ✓
Kate Guastaferro ✓ ✓
Jo Hart ✓
Sara Labbé ✓
Krisopher Lamore ✓
Élise Legault ✓
Sean Locke ✓
Mariantonia Lemos ✓
Paul Montgomery ✓
Grégory Ninot ✓ ✓ ✓
Chris Noone ✓ ✓
Nicola Paine ✓
Frank Penedo ✓
Justin Presseau ✓ ✓ ✓
Geneviève Rouleau ✓
Rebecca Seagrave ✓
Sherri Sheinfeld-Gorin ✓ ✓
Jovana Stojanovic ✓
Brigitte Voisard ✓

 

Administrative Team 2018 2019 2021 2022 2023
Cloé Blanchette-Carrière ✓
Cassandre Julien ✓
Thalie Labonté ✓
Guillaume Lacoste ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Nathalie Maroun ✓ ✓
Johanne O’Malley ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Paula Ribeiro ✓
Geneviève Szczepanik ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓