Older People Become What They Think, Study Shows - NYTimes.com

This article highlights the tremendous power of our mental state to influence our physical state. I'm particularly interested in the idea that cultural perceptions of aging influence individuals' expectations about aging which influences their health. Makes me wonder: could you design products that help contribute to positive stereotypes or at least a better mindset? Also, does this link hold true for young people as well?Older People Become What They Think, Study Shows - NYTimes.com.

The tricky business of providing people with feedback

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.  

An explosion in wearable activity monitors

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There has been an explosion in health and fitness tracking devices over the past year or so, it seems to be the killer app for wearable computing. There’s the Fitbit family of products, which range from the Zip that just tracks activity to the Aria wireless scale and of course the app. There’s the Bodymedia Fit, an armband designed to support weightloss. The MotoACTV, which tracks fitness and brings music into the equation. The Striiv play, which claims to make activity-tracking fun. The Nike Fuelband, which measures activity and challenges you to do more, the recently re-released Jawbone Up, which positions itself more as a holistic health and wellness device, Adidas micoach, which focuses on tracking performance and comparing yourself to others. And a whole slew of GPS watches by the likes of Garamin and Polar. As if that wasn’t enough, there are a few coming soon: the LarkLife, a clunkier butBluetooth enabled Up-like device, and the Shine by Misfit, which looks like it will be a sleeker Fitbit.

Some of these devices are positioned against weightloss. Others focus on collecting more metrics and enhancing sports performance. A few, like the Up, Fitbit and the Fuel, are a bit more generically oriented towards helping you lead a healthier life. Since I’m not about to go on a diet, or train for a marathon, those are the ones that interest me the most. I’m curious about what features and functions are motivating and which are annoying, and whether wearing these devices will indeed make me healthier. I’ll be writing about my experiments with them over the next few months, starting with the Nike Fuelbank, which arrived about a week ago.

Ten things you need to know about the future of health | Forum:Blog | The World Economic Forum

This is a great list of how things are changing. Some, like #6 and #8 strike me as extremely hopeful, as they require massive cultural change as well as organizational change.

Maybe #s 7, 9 and 10 will shake things up enough that those changes become possible.

Ten things you need to know about the future of health | Forum:Blog | The World Economic Forum.

Will 5% discounts inspire Wal-Mart shoppers to make healthier choices?

GreatForYouLogoWal-Mart and Humana are partnering to offer a 5% discount to HumanaVitality customers who choose foods labeled ‘Good for You’ in Wal-Mart stores.  A similar project that Humana piloted in South Africa showed that the discount did encourage shoppers to choose healthier items.

We know from studies of calorie labels on restaurant menus that mere information doesn’t encourage people to change their food choices. Will incentives?

For more information on the Wal-Mart Humana initiative: Wal-Mart, Humana to Offer Healthy Food Discount - ABC News.

For more information on the impact of calorie counting data: Calorie counts: Consumers' response to calorie listings on McDonald's menus is limited - Chicago Tribune.

Hello world!

Hello! I'm creating this blog to provide myself with a forum and motivation to write about a current interest --  the intersection between product design, technology, behavior change and health. Why this area? A few reasons. 1) I want to more consciously use design to change people's day to day lives in positive ways. I've spent most of my career understanding how to create products that fit into people's lives and make sense given their existing behaviors. That's critical to the design of successful new products. However, I'm currently most interested in pushing the boundaries of design research to learn how new products can not just fit into existing behaviors, but help people create new ones.

2) So many things can be done. I want to create new frameworks for understanding what should be done.  There have been so many technological advancements in the past decade. Computing power is cheap and small. Manufacturing can be done  swiftly almost anywhere in the world, including in your home or office. Global connectivity is at an all time high. I'm interested in pushing the boundaries of what's possible and exploring the best ways to employ all this technological possibility.

3) Healthcare is in flux. And health matters. Our healthcare system is broken and every individual working to make it better can make a difference. There are many places in the world where healthcare is a luxury, and there's a need to figure out how to provide care that is tailored to the particular constraints of those locations. At the same time, it's possible to empower individuals to take better care for themselves than ever before. I strongly believe that there are better ways to help people take care of themselves and others. Why not try to figure out how?

This blog will be a place for me to write about the projects that I'm involved in, personal and classroom experiences, current research, and interesting projects that other folks are working on. I hope you enjoy reading it.

Sarah