Will the sedentary smartphone owner please stand up?: Breaking bad health habits using technology

There is mounting evidence that sedentary lifestyles can seriously impact on health, contributing to obesity, cardiovascular problems and early mortality. At the same time, the increasing ownership of smartphones equipped with sensors that can accurately detect sedentary patterns presents an opportunity for pervasive technological interventions that target sedentary behaviour. Several approaches have been developed within the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) field of persuasive technology. However, such approaches tend to overlook existing research from psychology that demonstrates that strongly habitual behaviour is relatively impervious to interventions that simply provide information and feedback. This poster explores the application of habit formation and dual process theories to the practical development of effective pervasive persuasive sedentary behaviour change interventions. It explores theoretical underpinnings of why people develop sedentary habits, how technology could help to break these habits and form healthier ones, the expected difficulties that need to be overcome, and the proposed methodological approaches to evaluating such interventions