One of the big differences between the Jawbone Up and the Nike Fuelband is that Nike has built in a display that can show you your progress throughout the day. Press a button and you see how your Fuel, calorie and step counts for the day. The Up requires you to plug the device into your phone, wait for the data to be downloaded and then look at your progress.
This move has surprised many, as feedback seems to be one of the best ways to motivate people to change their behavior and stick to a new habit.
When I first got the Fuelband, I checked my progress incessantly. I love seeing how close I am to my goal, or how far. If I'm not close enough by about 7 PM, I start behaving differently -- being more willing to walk up and down the 3 flights of stairs in my house, for example, instead of trying to avoid it. And I do like the little digital celebration that happens when I hit my goal -- colors change, lights flash, and I feel good.
I decided to set up my Up to give me ongoing feedback as well. Since there is no display, I wanted to play with the vibration function. I set the Idle Alert to buzz whenever I was idle for more than 15 minutes. First, let me just say that wearing the Fuelband for a few weeks and hitting my goal may have given me a delusional sense of how active I am. I'm idle for 15 minutes at a time quite often. And for good reason: I'm eating dinner, watching a movie with my kids, out for a drink with my husband, writing, reading, etc. The alert buzzed so frequently that it made me feel kind of bad about myself. An annoyed. I'm not getting up from the movie just because my bracelet buzzed. So I learned to ignore the buzz. Finally, today, I'm changing it to a more reasonable 1 hour and 15 minute alert.
I think this is a misstep from Jawbone -- the band can give me feedback only when I'm not active, and not when I am. And the feedback has to be set to be pushed towards me -- the band vibrates at intervals. Which makes me want to separate those intervals farther apart. The Fuelband shows me how well I'm doing and when I'm not close enough to my goal -- in the same display. And I pull it up by pushing a button. When I push the button, I don't know if I'll get a thrill of success or disappointment of not achieving my goals. Which leads me to push the button pretty often.
So, for today, here's my conclusion:
- I like being able to control when I get feedback on how I'm doing -- I prefer to pull it from the device rather than having it pushed at me.
-I like getting both positive and negative feedback from the same display, rather than only getting feedback when I'm not hitting my goal.