Nurturing wearable and mHealth technologies for self-care: Mindset, tool set and skill set

Abstract

This study aimed to understand whether and how wearable technologies and mHealth services could be nurtured for self-care at the individual-level. We launched a self-care online survey in 2015, and a total of 188 participants (66% female; mean age = 30 years) completed the survey. Following the survey, we also conducted a qualitative study with 12 Fitbit users. In both studies, we focused on understanding three prerequisite elements for behavior change: mindset, tool set and skill set. The results showed that most people had the mindset that self-care was important for preventing chronic diseases, and their top health concerns were sleep quality, body weight, mood, skin conditions and chronic fatigue. As for tool set, users acknowledge the potentially positive impact and efficacy of the technologies in facilitating self-care. However, current technologies have several usability issues such as low accuracy, low technology transparency, and limited feedback. As for skill set, two major obstacles were identified: difficulty in sustaining the usage of the technologies, and lacking domain knowledge and data analysis skills to gain insights from personal data. Different from existing studies which mainly focused on understanding the tool set, i.e., the technologies and services per se, this study produced new insights on the current landscape of people's mindset and skill set on adopting the technologies for health behavior change. We also summarized the opportunities and challenges to guide researchers in designing new wearable technologies and mHealth services for self-care.