Rhetoric, Precarity, and mHealth Technologies

Teston, Christa

doi:10.1080/02773945.2016.1171694

Cited by 25 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Despite the presence of control mechanisms within networked technology, part of the rhetorical appeals used to encourage the adoption of networked technology is to disguise that relationship under the guise of "individual agency," "empowerment," and a "culture of health" (Teston, 2016). In human-computer interaction research, the arguments for behavioral change embedded in persuasive technology are described benignly as "nudges" (Fogg, 2002;Shin & Kim, 2018).…”

Section: Locus Of Controlmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rhetorical Implications of Contact Tracing Mobile Applications: An Examination of Big Data’s Work on the Body

Lanius

2021

Poroi

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For nearly a decade, big data has been hyped as an amazing new technology that will benefit corporations and consumers alike. By promising customized knowledge at an accelerated pace, big data technologies have slowly saturated the digital systems American consumers use to live, work, and play. Yet have the promised benefits materialized? An examination of the proposed contact tracing applications in response to the novel coronavirus alongside existing wearable technologies reveal that our trust and vulnerability, opening our bodies to be sensed by these networked systems, is a fraught rhetorical activity, but not because an omniscient system now sees us and cares for us in our time of grave need. Rather, the opaque system misunderstands our embodied rhetorical actions, is incapable of moving the American polis, and cannot generate the promised collective action.

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Section: Locus Of Controlmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rhetorical Implications of Contact Tracing Mobile Applications: An Examination of Big Data’s Work on the Body

Lanius

2021

Poroi

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“…Although the use of wearable devices or applications does not necessarily lead to the enhancement of exercise ability, it is argued, nonetheless, that such techniques could provide both motivation and triggers to the user [23]. Research suggests that when users are motivated by the rewarding feeling of achieving certain goals and making regular progress, they are likely to engage in more exercise or keep a healthy diet; wearables are also increasingly seen as a route to improving healthcare outcomes for at-risk populations [24]. As James Gilmore [19] suggests, smartwatches appear quite similar to smartphones, but their "overtly wearable nature creates a notable difference in how they provide certain forms of bodily orientation toward technology."…”

Section: Wearable Devicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resisting Surveillance: Responding to Wearable Device Privacy Policies

Banville

2020

Proceedings of the 38th ACM International Conference on Design of Communication

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This pilot study considers risk in association with wearable devices by placing body-monitoring in conversation with privacy policies (i.e. who is controlling your data, by what means, and to what end). This article focuses on the increasingly commonplace embodied technology that is both pervasive and invasive to individuals' privacy as determined through the device users' interpretation of corporate privacy policies. The primary focus is on the underexplored intersection of undergraduate students, wearable technology, and privacy, which ultimately advocates for transparency in corporate privacy policies. In this pilot study, it was found that users who read through the privacy policies of Fitbit and Google are more likely to change their passwords and emails, pay more attention to legal jargon, and may be less likely to link all of their applications through Google.

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“…In analyzing the affinities between personal responsibility and wellness culture, it bears noting that “Pep Talk” elides Hawking’s extreme economic, racial, educational, gender, and cultural privilege relative to most disabled people around the world, who are more likely to live in poverty than nondisabled people. Assessing wearables’ contributions to actual health outcomes, Christa Teston (2016) spotlights the intense disparity between, on the one side, the supposed democratization of health information via wearables and, on the other side, ongoing health disparities of minority populations. Teston (2016) asks,For what populations are wearables … revolutionary?…”

Section: Politicizing Immobilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Assessing wearables’ contributions to actual health outcomes, Christa Teston (2016) spotlights the intense disparity between, on the one side, the supposed democratization of health information via wearables and, on the other side, ongoing health disparities of minority populations. Teston (2016) asks,For what populations are wearables … revolutionary? How does one reconcile the fact that the United States has never before possessed more medical and health-related data, and yet the health of some of its most vulnerable populations is at greater risk than ever before?” (p. 252)…”

Section: Politicizing Immobilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“Find Your Fit”: Wearable technology and the cultural politics of disability

Elman

2018

New Media & Society

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By examining advertisements, technological design, workplace wellness programs, and legal discourses involving Fitbit activity trackers, this article examines how cultural ideas about disability infuse the representation, use, study, and implementation of wearable technology. Although Fitbit features wheelchair users prominently in advertising, Fitbit only measures movements in steps, and its use in workplace wellness programs has been accompanied by legal concerns about wellness programs’ potential weakening of workplace protections afforded to US workers by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA). This article shows that inspirational and tragic representations of disability work to depoliticize wearable technology and argues that disability needs to be a more central category of analysis for cultural studies and sociological studies of the cultural impacts of fitness tracking and wellness culture.

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Rhetoric, Precarity, and mHealth Technologies

Cited by 25 publications

References 26 publications

Rhetorical Implications of Contact Tracing Mobile Applications: An Examination of Big Data’s Work on the Body

Rhetorical Implications of Contact Tracing Mobile Applications: An Examination of Big Data’s Work on the Body

Resisting Surveillance: Responding to Wearable Device Privacy Policies

“Find Your Fit”: Wearable technology and the cultural politics of disability

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