A recent study suggests that the popular fitbit wearable doesn’t lead to weight loss. Worse — wearing a fitbit actually produces decreased weight loss. It turns out that using a fitbit doesn’t inspire the wearer to more physical activity. While that’s saddening, it’s not surprising — after all, merely wearing a new electronic toy is unlikely to change long ingrained habits of lethargy. It’s saddening because health studies show that increasing physical activity can dramatically improve your health. While some fitbit wearers doubtless changed their lifestyle, the available evidence from that study seems to show that most didn’t. So once again we have a paradoxical result from a personal digital appliance that was supposed to make us healthier…and wound up having the opposite effect overall.
Key Points:
- 1According to that same 2 year study, the answer to whether or not FitBit users moved more was no.
- 2Simply telling them to move more, or apparently showing them how little or how much they move, isn’t going to be enough in and of itself.
- 3If we want people to move more we need to find ways to make doing so easier, more fun, and/or more valuable.
It’s been all over the news these past few weeks, a recent study reported that not only didn’t wearing a FitBit as part of a weight loss program lead to increased weight loss, it led to decreased weight loss.
Read the full article at: https://www.weightymatters.ca/2016/10/fitbits-arent-supposed-to-make-you-lose.html
