Development of acceptability testing in the SMS4dads program - technical report

A key task in the SMS4dads Rural and Remote Fathers Department of Health funded grant (2021 – 2025) was ‘Undertaking ongoing service monitoring and evaluation for quality assurance’. While previous versions of SMS4dads had been externally evaluated and found to be successful and effective in supporting fathers 1, there were few measures of the acceptability of the program content. Incidental feedback from fathers was extremely positive, however the majority of text messages in SMS4dads are one-way with only occasional interactive texts asking for a response. The number of unsolicited text back comments, however positive, come from only a small fraction of those involved, so do not provide a credible evaluation of the materials.