Authors:
Ricardo Sol
and
Karolina Baras
Affiliation:
Exact Sciences and Engineering, University of Madeira, Madeira, Portugal
Keyword(s):
User Acceptance, Ubiquitous Systems, Personal Informatics, Personal Data Tracking, Wearable Computers, Sports/Exercise.
Abstract:
The conducted study seeks to learn if, why and how two different groups of Activity Trackers users, Athletes and Health Runners, are utilizing these devices for their self-quantification. The study is based on the content analysis of 20 semi-structured interviews, 10 of which were with Athletes. To achieve its goals, the authors use a model based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), a widely adopted technology acceptance theory. Amongst our findings, the construct Perceived Ease of Use showed that Athletes find it hard to program the settings for their training and Health Runners expressed that there is too much information involved. This paper contributes by showing that an all-purpose interface is not suitable and offers new knowledge for methodological discussions as it is, to the best of our knowledge, the first qualitative study to employ a TAM like model in order to qualitatively interpret the use of Activity Trackers.