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Encouraging Behavioral Change via Everyday Technologies to Reduce Risk of Developing Alzheimer’s Disease

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNISA,volume 8868))

Abstract

Alzheimer’s Disease is a global health concern, with no known cure. There is evidence, however, that certain risk factors can be targeted to prevent the development of the disease. Most of these risk factors are non-genetic and can be modified by behavioral change. In this paper, we present a smartphone app with a gamification element designed to encourage and track this behavior change as part of a 6-month randomized control trial with 146 participants. Initial results from the first 9 weeks of the study have been promising; 98% (n=102) of participants in the treatment group (n=104) are using the app on a daily basis to check their self-reported behaviors against recommended values, predominantly at the end of each day (9pm-12am). Additionally, based on session duration data, users appear to become familiar with the app following 1 week of use.

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© 2014 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

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Hartin, P.J. et al. (2014). Encouraging Behavioral Change via Everyday Technologies to Reduce Risk of Developing Alzheimer’s Disease. In: Pecchia, L., Chen, L.L., Nugent, C., Bravo, J. (eds) Ambient Assisted Living and Daily Activities. IWAAL 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8868. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-13105-4_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-13105-4_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-13104-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-13105-4

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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