🔗 Share this article Am I Hooked on My Fitness Tracker? Countless individuals catch themselves monitoring their devices innumerable times in the middle of a race. A sense of feeling of anticipation. Visible is the cold breath exhaled by my fellow runners as they perform the "pre-race" jiggle on the starting line. A rapid twitch of the hips. I'm participating in my local Saturday morning race and I'm serious. It's almost time... Wait a second. I must adjust my device. So does the person next to me. The person waiting expresses impatience. I won't start until… yes! GPS ready, and I'm running. During the scramble, it's challenging to see a arm without a fitness tracker on it. And this extends beyond us participants who rely on them. We're witnessing a booming, multi-billion pound industry. Names like Apple Watch lead the market, featuring an wide range of diverse models to suit a range of needs. Based on how advanced the watch you go for, costs can range from £100 to a significant investment. "It makes me crazy, I can't switch off." "It comforts me… It acts as a supporter encouraging me." "Stop telling me I've experienced a poor sleep." A handful of the comments I've had from other tracker enthusiasts when I ask what they think of theirs. Individuals are frequently questioning whether the metrics their device provides is reliable. The Monitoring Conundrum My current opinion on my own device? Currently, annoying. It's telling me my speed is wrong, causing me to question whether the trees I'm passing under are disrupting my GPS connection. Millions of us fasten these compact devices onto our arms and wear them constantly, apparently unconcerned with the fact they're perpetually tracking us. A distant memory are the days when we used them exclusively to give us an rough count of our pedometer reading. Currently, they can measure our sleep quality, stress levels, heart rate variability (HRV), our recovery score. It's difficult to find a health indicator they don't track. But can they do what they say they do? And are the data points we analyse a accurate representation of the truth? Do they boost our overall health, or do the multitude of readings and cheerleading alerts just add to our sense of overwhelm? Some users find the abundance of functions on their smartwatches to be "excessive" at times. A Love-Hate Relationship "I find myself getting a bit fixated with mine," one user confesses. While she loves how her device records her workouts, she finds some of its other capabilities "excessive" at times - a feeling first discovered during a significant period. Until she found out she could put it into a specific mode, her smartwatch kept telling her she was not being active enough. In a new phase, the watch frequently reports her she's had a restless night. "I've got a six-month old, it's unnecessary for me to be notified I'm tired," she says. "I'm acutely aware only too well." Why doesn't she just stop wearing it? "It's possible, perhaps, but I have this love-hate relationship with it," she explains. "I love it for its fitness insights, but I'm unsure whether all the other things it can now do is maybe excessive for me." Inside the Device Different brands of smartwatch has its own proprietary way of tracking your bodily functions and interpreting your data, but the vast bulk use sensors on the reverse of the watch. They commonly shine tiny, coloured LED lights onto your skin which can detect capillary action, identifying your heartbeat. Higher-end devices detect changes in the bioimpedance that passes over the skin to gauge your recovery state. Expert Perspectives A data scientist says that for most people for smartwatches, it's a "difficult line" - while the ever-evolving tech could potentially aid early diagnosis, "identifying issues before we notice anything", it could also turn us the tracked into the "worried well". He points out that some of the latest wearables can conduct tests like medical-grade monitoring, which continuously monitor how normal the heart is. They can flag if someone is experiencing atrial fibrillation (AF), where there is erratic signals in the heart causing an arrhythmia. This does not mean someone is imminently going to suffer a cardiac event, but it can give an preliminary indication they might be more vulnerable of a blood clot in the future. But how to interpret these readings is complicated. The expert fears that as more functions are incorporated, people may not be able to fully comprehend their data. "I remain sceptical that the ability to monitor so much data is such a good idea," he says. A health researcher focusing on patient behaviour concurs. Research into the impact of wearable tech on a cohort of cardiovascular patients suggested a significant portion of those who were given devices to monitor their cardiac function experienced increased anxiety and were "more inclined to use doctor's time". She identified a cycle with her patients - they noticed a alarming metric on their watch. They became worried. Their BPM went up. They got even more concerned. They checked again, and their anxiety went up again. "Upon viewing data about ourselves that we can't properly interpret then, understandably, we are going to want to know more," the psychologist says. "We check, we check again - it becomes a vicious cycle."