Explanation for the choice of comparators {6b}
Buildings and study participants assigned to the comparator arm [Arm 4] are recruited and followed over approximately a 12-month period to assess outcomes. No additional programs or services are delivered to the buildings or residents assigned to this arm beyond standard programs that NYCHA may provide to support the smoke-free mandate. Field staff document any policy-related signage, activities, or information to which these participants are exposed. We expect and have confirmed that Smoke-Free NYCHA’s liaison program will occur during our period of data collection during which they will conduct programming and activities that support compliance to the smoke-free policy. As such, the buildings enrolled in our “Standard NYCHA approach” are buildings that the Smoke-Free NYCHA team has identified as locations for concentrated efforts of their own smoke-free programming over the course of our data collection period. We will therefore evaluate the impact of this parallel prevention program including a covariate for NYCHA study participation at baseline in the models specified below. We will further allow for an interaction between the NYCHA study participation indicator and the treatment group.