A wearable-enhanced fitness program for older adults, combining fitness trackers and gamification elements: the pilot study fMOOC@Home

Abstract

Purpose
Besides nutrition, physical activity is one of the most important prerequisites for healthy aging. The public funded R&D project fMOOC (Fitness MOOC—interaction of older adults with wearable fitness trackers in a Massive Open Online Course), aimed at encouraging older adults to increase their physical activity with the help of a senior-friendly wearable enhanced training system composed of a smartphone training-app coupled with an activity-tracking device.

Methods
In a pilot study, we evaluated the training system in the home environment of older adults—20 older adults, used the smartphone app and the activity-tracking device for 4 weeks. We investigated the usability of the system using validated usability tests and asked the participants about use patterns and acceptance. We also examined the effectiveness of the training by measuring changes in strength, physical activity, balancing ability and endurance.

Results
The analysis of the data shows that the majority of the participants (60%) engaged in the training program on a regular basis. Among the various technical components of the training program, the fitness tracking devices were used most frequently (90% on a daily basis). An interesting result is that even within a short training period of 4 weeks, and within the small sample of 20 participants, the data showed significant health improvements regarding the duration of daily physical activity (T(19) = − 2.274; p < 0.05) and the balancing ability (T(19) = − 3.048; p < 0.01).

Conclusion
A wearable-enhanced fitness training program, can motivate older adults to be more physically active.

Full text

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Sport Sciences for Health (2018) 14:275–282
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11332-017-0424-z
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
A wearable‑enhanced tness program forolder adults, combining
tness trackers andgamication elements: thepilot study fMOOC@
Home
AnikaSteinert1· IlonaBuchem2· AgatheMerceron2· JörnKreutel2· MartenHaesner1
Received: 8 June 2017 / Accepted: 29 December 2017 / Published online: 10 January 2018
© Springer-Verlag Italia S.r.l., part of Springer Nature 2018
Abstract
Purpose Besides nutrition, physical activity is one of the most important prerequisites for healthy aging. The public funded
R&D project fMOOC (Fitness MOOC—interaction of older adults with wearable fitness trackers in a Massive Open Online
Course), aimed at encouraging older adults to increase their physical activity with the help of a senior-friendly wearable
enhanced training system composed of a smartphone training-app coupled with an activity-tracking device.
Methods In a pilot study, we evaluated the training system in the home environment of older adults—20 older adults, used
the smartphone app and the activity-tracking device for 4weeks. We investigated the usability of the system using validated
usability tests and asked the participants about use patterns and acceptance. We also examined the effectiveness of the train-
ing by measuring changes in strength, physical activity, balancing ability and endurance.
Results The analysis of the data shows that the majority of the participants (60%) engaged in the training program on a
regular basis. Among the various technical components of the training program, the fitness tracking devices were used most
frequently (90% on a daily basis). An interesting result is that even within a short training period of 4weeks, and within the
small sample of 20 participants, the data showed significant health improvements regarding the duration of daily physical
activity (T(19)=−2.274; p<0.05) and the balancing ability (T(19)=−3.048; p<0.01).
Conclusion A wearable-enhanced fitness training program, can motivate older adults to be more physically active.
Keywords Older adults· Physical activity· Wearables· Usability
Background
The World Health Organization (WHO) defines physical
activity (PA) as “any bodily movement produced by the skel-
etal muscles that requires energy expenditure” [1]. Regu-
lar PA reduces the risks of several health problems such
as cardiovascular diseases, type II diabetes and metabolic
syndrome [2, 3]. Intervention strategies to increase PA, and
to quantify the rate and magnitude of change in risk factors,
are important. Intervention studies have shown that already
in a short exercise training of 4–6weeks positive changes,
e.g. in lowering blood pressure can be achieved [4]. The
impact of fitness components increases when people age;
regular PA is particularly important for older adults to main-
tain their mobility and to reduce the risk of falls, as well as
injury from falls [5]. Theories on enhancing PA behavior
and maintenance suggest that during the development of
strategies, individual psychosocial processes, such as goal-
setting, motivation and self-efficacy, must be considered [6,
7].
Motivational aspects, such as predictors of regular par-
ticipation in PA and barriers, which hinder people from
being active, have been well studied in the older population.
Even though a lower age correlates with PA, and having an
early history of PA has also been described as a predictor
of future PA, age does not seem to be a strong predictor of
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this
article (http s://doi.org/10.1007 /s113 32-017-0424 -z) contains
supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
* Anika Steinert
anika.steinert@charite.de
1 Geriatrics Research Group, Charité-Universitätsmedizin
Berlin, 13347Berlin, Germany
2 Department ofInformation Science andMedia, Beuth
University ofApplied Sciences Berlin, 13353Berlin,
Germany
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