Is It Possible I'm Addicted to This Fitness Tracker?

A sense of feeling of anticipation. Apparent is the cold breath coming from my fellow runners as they do the "about to run" shuffle on the starting line.

A quick twitch of the hips.

I'm at my local Saturday morning race and I'm focused. It's almost time...

Wait a second. I must adjust my tracker. As does the runner alongside me.

The person waiting sighs. I'm not moving until… yes! Signal acquired, I'm off.

Amidst the crowd, it's challenging to spot a arm without a fitness tracker on it. And this extends beyond us participants who rely on them.

This is a thriving, multi-billion dollar industry. Brands like Apple Watch dominate, all offering an broad array of different models to cater to a spectrum of needs. Based on how advanced the watch you choose, price tags can vary between a hundred pounds to a small fortune.

"It drives me insane, I can't relax."

"It reassures me… It acts as a friend encouraging me."

"Please don't notify me I've experienced a poor sleep."

A handful of the comments people have shared from other device users when I ask what they their opinion is on theirs.

A Sea of Statistics

My current opinion on my own device? Right now, irritating. It's telling me my speed is wrong, causing me to question whether the foliage I'm passing under are blocking my satellite signal.

Millions of us strap these compact devices onto our wrists and wear them 24/7, apparently comfortable with the fact they're continuously recording us.

Long past are the days when we depended on them only to give us an estimation of our step count. Now, they can measure our nightly rest, heart rate, oxygen saturation, our body battery.

It's tricky to find a physical metric they fail to monitor.

But can they do what they advertise? And are the data points we analyse a accurate representation of the truth? Do they boost our overall health, or do the plethora of metrics and constant notifications just contribute to our everyday anxiety?

A Love-Hate Relationship

"I find myself getting a quite preoccupied with mine," one user admits.

While she appreciates how her device records her exercise, she finds some of its other capabilities "daunting" at times - a feeling initially realised during a major life event.

Before she realised she could change its configuration, her smartwatch constantly alerted her she was not being productive enough. In a new phase, the watch frequently reports her she's had a bad night's sleep.

"I've got a young baby, there's no point to be told my sleep was poor," she says. "I'm acutely aware perfectly well."

Why doesn't she just stop wearing it?

"I suppose I could, I suppose, but I'm in this push-pull dynamic 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 perhaps too much for me."

The Technology Behind the Tracking

Different brands of smartwatch has its own unique way of measuring your health metrics and interpreting your data, but the most use optical sensors on the reverse of the watch.

They commonly project tiny, coloured LED lights onto your arm which can monitor pulsation, recording your BPM. Sophisticated devices analyse changes in the skin conductance that passes over the skin to get an idea of your nervous system activity.

Expert Perspectives

A professor says that in general for smartwatches, it's a "fine balance" - while the ever-evolving tech could actually prevent illness, "identifying issues before we show symptoms", it could also turn us the tracked into the "worried well".

He points out that newer wearables can carry out tests like heart rhythm analysis, which regularly monitor how normal the heart is. They can alert if someone is experiencing a heart arrhythmia, where there is abnormal signals in the heart causing an uneven pulse.

This does not necessarily indicate someone is on the verge of a heart attack, but it can give an advance notice they might be more vulnerable of a heart problem in the years to come.

But how to understand these readings is complicated. The expert concerns that as additional features are added, people may not be able to fully comprehend their data.

"I have some doubts that being able to monitor so much data is such a good idea," he says.

A health researcher specialising in patient behaviour agrees. A study into the impact of wearable tech on a cohort of individuals with health issues suggested a significant portion of those who were given devices to monitor their cardiac function experienced greater stress and were "had a higher tendency to use doctor's time".

She observed a pattern with her patients - they saw a worrying figure on their watch. They grew concerned. Their BPM rose. They got more worried. They checked again, and their heart rate increased again.

"Upon viewing data about ourselves that we don't really understand then, naturally, we are going to want to know more," the psychologist says. "We monitor, we check again - it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy."