Activity tracking

Abstract

Standard activity trackers preprocess raw personal data from accelerometers and gyroscopes, to provide meaningful results in the form of step counts, calories burned, and progress over time. What happens though, when the built-in algorithms are not calibrated to an individual's physiological characteristics? Specifically, is 16 consecutive days of an activity rating at "-1" a meaningful diagnostic or a data disaster? This paper highlights results from a preliminary study exploring the user experience of persons with chronic disease and/or cognitive disabilities with off-the-shelf wearable activity tracking devices. Results show that though these devices can be useful to determine baselines, trends and deviation in activity, their current one-size-fits-all analytics, coupled with their closed data policies, introduce a significant data disaster for this population.