On some phones, especially Samsung Galaxy devices, apps can automatically be placed into deep sleep mode. When this happens, the phone prevents the app from running in the background to save battery and improve performance.
For m-Path studies, this can be problematic because apps in deep sleep may no longer receive notifications.
Apps in deep sleep cannot receive notifications anymore
What are Deep Sleeping Apps?
Deep sleeping apps are apps that your phone restricts from running in the background. This usually happens when an app has not been used for a longer period of time.
An app can be placed into deep sleep automatically by the phone. This can happen to any app, including m-Path.
When m-Path is placed in deep sleep mode, the app may still be installed on the phone, but it may no longer receive study notifications.
Why Deep Sleeping Apps Block Notifications
Deep sleep mode is designed to reduce battery use. To do this, the phone limits what an app can do in the background.
For many apps, this is not a problem. For m-Path, however, background activity is important because the app needs to receive and show notifications for questionnaires.
This is especially relevant in multi-wave or longitudinal study designs where participants may not receive questionnaires for a longer period of time, for example several weeks or a month. During this inactive period, participants may not open m-Path. The phone may then interpret m-Path as an unused app and place it in deep sleep mode.
As a result, when the next burst starts, some participants may no longer receive m-Path notifications.
How to Stop m-Path from Going Into Deep Sleep
To reduce the risk of m-Path being placed into deep sleep mode, we recommend keeping the app active during the study.
A practical way to do this is to regularly send a very short questionnaire to m-Path app users, for example once per week. This questionnaire does not need to contain actual questions. Its main purpose is simply to encourage participants to open m-Path from time to time.
This helps the phone recognize that m-Path is still being used and reduces the chance that the app is placed into deep sleep mode.
For studies with long pauses between questionnaires, it is important to take this into account during study planning. If no questionnaires are sent for a longer period of time, some participants may need to reactivate m-Path before they can receive notifications again.
How to Remove an App from Deep Sleep Mode
If a participant no longer receives m-Path notifications, the app may be in deep sleep mode.
Participants can try the following steps:
- Open the m-Path app manually. In some cases, simply opening the app is enough to activate it again.
- If notifications still do not arrive, manually remove m-Path from the phone’s deep sleeping apps list. On Samsung phones, this is usually done as follows:
- Open Settings.
- Go to Battery and device care.
- Tap Battery.
- Tap Background usage limits.
- Open Deep sleeping apps.
- Tap the three dots or More options.
- Select Remove apps.
- Select m-Path.
- Tap Remove.
- Open the m-Path app again.
- The exact wording may differ slightly depending on the phone model or Android version.
- If the participant still does not receive notifications, they can uninstall and reinstall the m-Path app.If they use their recovery code after reinstalling the app, the study can continue with the same participant ID.