Study Setting and Recruitment
physical disabilities
RECRUITMENT, RECRUITMENT
Selangor is the most populated state in Malaysia, with the highest number of children (1.8 million children) [A total of 16 government preschools in the Petaling district were randomly selected. The operators of the preschools were then approached to participate in the study via phone calls and meetings. Recruitment of participants was originally planned for January 2020. However, owing to the closure of schools following COVID-19–related lockdowns, it was postponed until March 2021 to June 2021. The inclusion criteria for preschools were government preschools with classes for children aged 3 to 4 years. Regarding the mother-child dyad, those who were included were mothers with preschoolers aged 3 to 4 years, registered with government preschools in Petaling during the recruitment period in 2021 who reported their children’s screen time as >1 hour per day in the past month. They also needed to have access to smartphones and be willing to use WhatsApp as a medium of interaction. Mothers with physical or mental disabilities and children with physical disabilities, as certified by medical practitioners, were excluded from the study.To recruit the participants, mothers of children aged 3 to 4 years within the designated clusters were identified from the enrollment database for the year 2021 and recruited. Preschool educators distributed electronic pamphlets containing brief information about the study to all mothers. Interested mothers can self-register using a Google Form link in the pamphlet. Eligible mothers who consented to participate were then added to a WhatsApp group managed by a research assistant. All participants were informed that they would receive the relevant interventions in stages within the next 6 months. Hence, they were blinded and unaware of their group allocation throughout the study.