Table 1 Definitions of health-relevant behavioural changes

Smoking: abstinence or reduction of daily number of cigarettes by ≥ 50% from a baseline of ≥ 15 cigarettes

Self-declaration, confirmatory saliva cotinine test at 12 months for quitters

[18, 27]

Body weight: reduction by ≥ 5% if baseline-BMI ≥ 25 kg/m²

Standardised home measurements

[28,29,30, 45, 46]

Physical activity: increase of MVPA by ≥ 90 min per week or increase of LIPA by ≥ 200 min per week, compared to baseline

Recollection-based self-declaration in questionnaire

[31,32,33]

Alcohol: reduction in number of standard drinks (10 g) per week by ≥ 7 drinks from a baseline of ≥ 14 drinks/week

Recollection-based self-declaration in questionnaire

[35, 36, 47]

Stress: reduction in score of the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10, German version) by ≥ 5, compared to baseline

Recollection-based self-declaration in validated questionnaire

[38,39,40,41]

Diet: increase by ≥ 10 in score of adapted MedDietScore questionnaire, compared to baseline

Recollection-based self-declaration in validated questionnaire

[44, 48]

Participant’s choice: increase by ≥ 2 levels on a 5 level Likert-type scale (−/0/+/++/+++)

Self-declaration in questionnaire

–