Wearables: A New Age Of Health Tracking

It’s easy to wake up and say you feel great or tired today. But how do you really know? Subjective measurements are important; however, the brain is a tricky organ. It can have you think something completely true when that may not be the case. Current wearables are a great way to measure modern day activity. Rather than subjective, they are an objective way to track how you are feeling. With so many different wearables (Apple watch, Garmin, Fitbit, Oura Ring, Whoop) all measuring roughly the same variables, the question is not which wearable to get, but rather what to do with the information given.

Most wearables collect similar information: heart rate, heart variability, readiness, sleep scores, steps, movement, etc... Separately, these are important measurements though myopic. Collectively, they become a comprehensive snapshot into our daily lives. A snapshot that allows for correlation: If you wake tired, do your scores match? If so, what did you do differently?

Wearables allow us to better understand our subjective bias versus the objective truth. From there, inferences can be made. If I wake up tired and my sleep/readiness score is poor, what did I do the night before differently? If I drank a glass of wine (the bottle), how does that affect my heart rate, sleep, mood the next morning? This correlation my seem obvious at first, “I drank a bottle of wine and feel hungover”, but the true power lies with all the independent points collected: Heart rate, heart rate variability, light/REM/Deep sleep, and how they are all affected differently to create the overall subjective feeling of being hungover.

 A bottle of wine may be an extreme example, so let’s try something a little more subtle: A snack and ice cream an hour before bed. This may have no subjective affect the next morning. However, when checking scores, one may see the differences in data collected. On a given night, these differences may have no effect, but compounding days can reset one’s “normal” to a less optimal level. Increased heart rate, decreased heart rate variability, increased time for resting heart rate to level. They are minor changes, but changes in the wrong direction.

Having the knowledge of these differences may be enough for us to make changes in our habits. This is called the Hawthorne effect - “When individuals modify aspects of their behavior when they know they are being observed”. While we may be the only ones observing our data, it still gives rise to this affect enough to make changes for the betterment of our health. 

With a lot of benefits, wearables still have their downsides. They are in their infancy of creation from a hardware and software standpoint; still needing updates to keep up with research. They can create addictive behavior, leading to anxiety around sleep and exercise. Lastly, to an unknowing user, one may confuse correlation with causation, creating unrealistic expectations to changes made. 

In the end, wearables are great, but they are a tool. A tool to help us better understand our habits in an objective manner. They are our Yoda to Luke Skywalker, guiding us down a path to better health rather than telling us what to do. If nothing else, wearables are a fun way to gather insight into our physiology as humans. A way to better understand ourselves and our habits.