ERIC Number: EJ1142925
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2016
Pages: 12
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1939-1382
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Representing and Reconciling Personal Data and Experience in a Wearable Technology Gaming Project
Ching, Cynthia Carter; Stewart, Mary K.; Hagood, Danielle E.; Rashedi, Roxanne Naseem
IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies, v9 n4 p342-353 Oct-Dec 2016
Extant literature has largely not examined how users critically engage with their physical activity monitors, as objective data sense-making is often deemed superior to users' subjective realities. Our research, however, examines how middle-school youth encounter the representation of their data, as it is converted and actionable in an online game. This ethnographic study illustrates how youth negotiate conflicts between their data and embodied experience. Using a grounded theory approach, our analysis of interviews and focus groups reveals emergent categories of resistance such as youth evaluating the incompatibility of the device, disputing the device's step-count accuracy and syncing, and disputing the game's conversion of steps. In particular, we highlight the ways youth sometimes privileged their embodied recollections over the device's seemingly accurate data. The article also provides a case of a day during implementation when youth converged on a single form of resistance, game conversion, and examines their reasoning and alternate forms of data validation that we saw in-action on that day. Finally, we discuss benefits to learning and critical engagement that result from users' disputes and conclude by positing the promise in designing physical activity monitors for engagement, instead of exclusively persuasion or reward.
Descriptors: Physical Activity Level, Measurement, Electronic Equipment, Ethnography, Middle School Students, Computer Games, Grounded Theory, Student Attitudes, Interviews, Focus Groups, Physical Activities, Data Collection, Users (Information), Rewards, Educational Benefits, Health Behavior, Computer Software, Program Descriptions, Case Studies
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. 445 Hoes Lane, Piscataway, NJ 08854. Tel: 732-981-0060; Web site: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=4620076
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Middle Schools; Secondary Education; Junior High Schools
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: National Science Foundation (NSF)
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: California
Grant or Contract Numbers: IIS1451446; IIS1217317
Author Affiliations: N/A