Table 1.

Quality appraisal of included EMA studies

Topic: quality criteria	Strong	Moderate	Weak
Rationale
1. Rationale for EMA design provided: Why was an EMA design chosen to examine the research question?	A strong rationale provided for the EMA design of predictor AND behaviour/ outcome.	Rationale provided but not very strong for the EMA design of either the predictor OR behaviour/outcome.	No rationale for the EMA design regarding predictor and behaviour/outcome.
Power analysis, sample size and participant adherence
2. Power analysis: A priori power analysis to determine sample size	An a priori power analysis is reported and the enrolled sample size met power analysis indication / OR: sufficient explanation as to why an a priori power analysis was not needed	An a priori power analysis is reported but sufficient sample size/number of observations was not achieved.	No information about power analysis / OR: a post-hoc power analysis is reported.
3. Adherence to EMA protocol: Percentage of answered EMA prompts across all participants for the main EMA study period	Percentage of answered EMA prompts >80%.	Percentage of answered EMA prompts 60%–79.99%.	Percentage of answered EMA prompts <60%.
Data analysis
4. Treatment of missingness: Report whether study dropout or non-adherence to EMAs (eg, missed prompts) are related to specific variables	Missing mechanisms/predictors are identified, reported and mitigated for if needed.	Missing mechanisms/predictors are identified and reported but not mitigated for.	Missing mechanisms/predictors are not identified or reported.

EMA, ecological momentary assessment.