Can Consumer Wearables Provide Information for Stress Measurements?
Abstract: Psychiatric diagnoses are growing as the most common reason for people in Sweden to leave in sick from work, and within this category, stress-related health problems is the largest. At the same time, a market of wearables is exploding with new ways to keep track of health. What if these consumer products could be used in the work of preventing stress? This study is an investigation in the potential use of two different commercial smart watches for recording stress levels on individual and organizational basis. The test products have gone through three substudies, to see what they can measure, how accurate they are and what experiences they provide the user, and thus find out if they can serve as stress trackers or not. It was found that both devices managed to track changes in heart rate when a person sitting still was exposed to stress. Secondly, a link was found between the amount of deep sleep and a stress value that was presented by the Garmin watch. Single stress events presented in a diagram on the mobile application could also be correlated with moments of high self-perceived stress. A user experience test resulted in overall poor scores for the test products, although Fitbit was significantly better than Garmin in attractiveness and stimulation. Overall, the watches do provide approved accuracy in measuring heart rate, but it takes more than that to track stress in an effective way. It is crucial to also have a feature that makes calculations between heart rate and physical activity. This led to the conclusion that wearables with integrated stress features can be a useful tool to monitor stress, as long as the information is presented in an appropriate way for the user - a combination of technology and good design.
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