The roles, functions, and types of quantified health-related feedback information on smart device

Abstract

This research examines the mechanisms by which Quantified Self (QS) information and feedback modalities delivered via wearable smart devices support individuals' pursuit of health-related goals. Although smart bands and smartwatches continuously generate quantified physical activity and health data, prior research has focused largely on raw numerical outputs, leaving unclear which informational functions strengthen motivation and how transformed feedback modalities shape actual behavior. Across two studies, we investigated how specific informational functions shape motivation to pursue goals (Study 1) and how the interaction between social comparison feedback and goal-framing feedback influences actual goal-directed behavior (Study 2). In Study 1, we analyzed survey data from 321 smart-band users using structural equation modeling. The results showed that all three primary informational functions — information about physical activity, health status, and rewards — significantly and positively increased goal-pursuit motivation, with physical activity information emerging as the strongest predictor (β = .445, p < .001). In Study 2, a 2 (social comparison: downward vs. upward) × 2 (goalframe: to-date vs. to-go) between-subjects experiment (N = 109) was conducted using an actual walking task. The two-way ANOVA revealed a statistically significant interaction effect on the proportion of post-feedback steps. Specifically, downward comparison feedback paired with a to-go frame elicited significantly higher goaldirected behavior than when paired with a to-date frame, whereas upward comparison feedback combined with a to-date frame was significantly more effective than when combined with a to-go frame. These findings demonstrate that tailoring goal framing to the specific motivational state induced by social comparison optimizes behavioral adherence. Practically, the results indicate that developers of smart bands and mobile healthcare applications should match the framing of progress information to the direction of social comparison feedback, offering critical theoretical and practical implications for user interface and gamification design in mobile digital healthcare.