Use of the device

In the beginning of the interview the participants were asked to explain how they use their device in their daily lives. Table 3 highlights some of the physical activities they participate in and have found their devices to be of use for. Walk-ing, joggWalk-ing, and running were the most common activities among the partici-pants as these were something that everyone did at some point. Two other common activities were biking and gym or weight training, which most of the participants did occasionally.

TABLE 3 Types of physical activities

During the interviews, participants were also asked to list the types of infor-mation that their wearable device collects. These inforinfor-mation types are listed in table 4, which are all common among the wearable devices. Not all the devices offered all the functionalities on the list, but this is an aggregate list of potential things that the devices could collect.

TABLE 4 Information types collected by wearable devices

Devices are often used as wristwatches and then in active use during the exer-cises or training activities. Outside of these times the devices passively collect and calculate activity levels, which are shown as a number or percent for the user on their devices screen. One of the concerns that was brought up by two participant was that step counting, which in turn impacted daily activity levels wasn’t being measured accurately outside of exercises. This issue made it so that these individuals didn’t find as much use for the devices except during training periods.

Participants enjoyed and found it useful to receive feedback or infor-mation during their exercises and for many, this was the main reason to pur-chase the device. Being able to see one’s heart rate (HR) during training was the most important feature and the reason individuals had bought a device that can measure HR from their wrist without needing a chest strap. Been able to see average speed or pace was also useful information during running and biking.

One of the participants said the following concerning the use of their wearable device:

I purchased an activity tracker because I wanted to measure heart rate during exer-cises and using a chest strap is uncomfortable. An activity tracker is already with you as a watch, so it’s easy to turn on the heart rate functionality during the exercises.

Information was viewed from the device right after the exercise to make sure that the activity is saved. Many of the participants review their daily activity levels in the evenings, and also at the end of the week when they synchronize their devices data to their smart phone, computer, or cloud. One user described the use of their device in the following way:

I use the information during exercises and then download the graphs to my phone.

Then I’m able to see in what heart rate ranges I have been exercising. I also write notes about my training that I can use later when comparing my exercises.

Not all the participants were certain if their information is also being stored to a cloud service provided by the manufacturer, but most assumed that this must be the case. Most devices offer a companion mobile application that stores the data from the wearable device and also enables the user to modify the data and make additions such as missed exercises. Most device manufacturers provided cloud service with an online interface and most the participants used this ser-vice at some level, but less than the mobile application.

Most of the participants wear their device during the entire day, but take it off for sleeping. Most of the devices offer some form of sleep tracking, but only two individuals wore it regularly during nights. Most of the other participants had tried the sleep-tracking feature, but don’t use it at all or rarely. The two main reasons not to track sleep was that participants didn’t find the information useful for them and the second hindrance was that the devices were consider large and bulky and interfered with sleeping.

There are also some other occasions when participants are not wearing their devices. One of the participants said they take the device off during ex-tended periods of sitting, the reason being that the device is quite large and heavy. Other times the device was taken off was during some exercises that lim-it wearing watches and jewelry such as martial arts. Two participants were un-able to wear their devices during most working hours as they were doing phys-ical therapy and massage and the device would be in the way of their work.

One user described it in this way:

I mainly use the activity tracker for measuring my heart rate during jogging and check the steps count while I’m wearing it. I’m unable to use it at work because it’s in the way, so for almost 10 hours per day I can’t use it. I had a different tracker before, which I actually wore on my ankle to measure steps, but that wasn’t very accurate.

Two participants keep a rest day during the week from their exercises to give time for their bodies’ time to recover. During these resting days they choose not to wear the device at all because they knew they wouldn’t reach the daily activi-ty level goals that the device shows. They preferred not to see the low activiactivi-ty levels during these days as this might cause them anxiety and make it harder not to do more physical activity. Also some of the devices give notifications if a person doesn’t move enough to encourage to get moving and this was found to be useful, but not desirable during the resting days.