Project 3

Project Goals

In this project, our goal is to create or modify an existing activity tracker application that links to a basic wearable device, empowering users to be healthier through behavior change. We will do this by describing and systematically altering the user’s mental model about what activities are beneficial, rewarding these behaviors rather than common “cheats” to the system.

Methods Used

Our team interviewed a handful of individuals, who consisted mostly of college students, to gain a better idea of their habits and motivators regarding physical activity. We asked a variety of questions to better understand their experiences and perspectives regarding their physical activity. We wanted to know what motivates them to participate in physical activity, what their favorite ways to exercise are, what barriers they face to be active, and whether or not they use technology to enhance their experience while exercising. The data from these interviews helped us find patterns within their experiences. We found that our interview group thoroughly enjoys exercising because it is a stress reliever and helps how they feel overall. They also have a variety of exercises they enjoy, including walking, group workouts, lifting weights, and running. Furthermore, a few of them do use technology, mobile devices, and applications to help motivate them to stay active. There were a few barriers, including time management with busy schedules, weather, and comfortability in the gym. These findings, along with our secondary research, will help us pinpoint areas where we can enhance college students’ experience while exercising. 

Our team conducted an affinity diagramming session to synthesize all of our findings from our interviews and observations.

Key Findings

Problem Statement: College students need a more motivating way to track their physical health and fitness with incentives to prevent cheating.

Design Question: How can we motivate students to engage more in their physical health and fitness without cheating while influencing others to focus more on their physical health too?

Interviews

To introduce our research through interviews, we were trying to identify motivations, patterns, and barriers among college students as they do physical activity. Each team member interviewed one college student after conducting secondary research to get a better idea of their physical fitness routine.

Our research revealed that for college students the main use for physical fitness is used as a stress reliever. Especially for college students with stressful exams and busy schedules, working out provides feelings in your body of relaxing and de-stressing making your body feel better, however, because of those buddy schedules college students tend to workout alone but occasionally still workout with their friends. Even though working out is a big stress reliever for college students, motivation to actually work out depends on friends and peers, their schedules, and the availability for workout classes, because they put personal responsibilities first. Technology also has a big impact on college student’s physical fitness. Since most students walk to class every day wearable technology is very helpful for students because students like to track their steps and calories. From our interviews, it is also revealed that although working out relieves stress, college students also work out to maintain a healthy and strong body therefore weightlifting is the preferred form of exercise among college students. Overall, these interview findings convey the importance of physical fitness to college student’s mental and physical health.

Summary

Our primary and secondary research allowed us to find a wide variety of information about the topic at hand. In our secondary research, our goal was to better understand the problem of fitness tracker cheating, specifically the motivation behind it in college. Then, through our interviews, we wanted to get a better feel for college students’ views on fitness and the possible barriers within focusing on college students in this realm.

In our secondary research, we found that 18% of college students don’t do any sort of physical activity consistently. This proved to us that this is an important target market, as it is vital to start creating these habits now, before it is more important for their health.

Continually, an article mentioned that there is a large gender consideration when it comes to motivation. Men are generally driven by competition, while women generally use it as a stress reliever or are motivated by the health benefits. Thus, we need to ensure that our solution caters to both parties, by creating something that can be competitive, but isn’t stressful.

Our interviews reinforced this claim. Multiple participants mentioned that they use fitness as a form of stress relief. Specifically, they said that school work generally keeps them more stressed than they ever were prior to starting college, so it is nice to take a break while still being productive.

Most of the students we interviewed said that they preferred working out with others because it helped keep them motivated, but that they generally ended up working out alone because of class schedules and personal responsibilities. Thus, by using an app where they could still track others and show off their own progress to their friends, even if they didn’t do the physical workout together, our solution is a great alternative to simply not working out because their friends are too busy.

Finally, we found that technology plays a big role in fitness, especially in college. Students enjoy that things like their Apple watches track their steps and calories, even as they do things like walk to class. It allows them to feel like they are staying active, even if they don’t have time to actually set aside to work out on that particular day.

Final Solution

Our solution to this problem is to create a fitness “social media” application, of sorts, that is catered toward college students. Within this app, students will be encouraged to get outdoors and explore their new surroundings through various hikes and trails in their area. They can follow their friends and college institution’s group, where they will be able to find unique spots by scrolling through the recorded paths people have posted. 

Continually, similar to geocaching, people can leave small “prizes” with names or a target audience on them at the turn-around point, or middle, of the hike. This will be a fun way to motivate people. At this point, they will be able to take and “post” a selfie of them at the spot, which will allow the hike to count in their profile. 

Finally, for each mile hiked, they will receive a certain number of stars. At specific “mile”-stones, they will level up, earning prizes such as Summit Seeker merch, along with new titles in their profiles.

Personal Contribution

Helped with exploration and ideation of our project. I also created our problem statement to be specific and accurate towards our target audience. Additionally, I did some secondary research on a scholarly resource, and helped with the summary and putting our references in our documentation. I also conducted one interview. I worked on the activity theory with Caitlyn. I also contributed to the affinity diagram with my team.