The present protocol introduces a non-commercial self-developed application for collecting real-time on-site data, including psychological scales, GPS location, heart rate, and blood-oxygen saturation level, as well as the application's operating procedures. An empirical study conducted in Taiwan in 2020 was used as an application example.
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Method Article
An Application for Pairing with Wearable Devices to Monitor Personal Health Status
In This Article
Summary
Abstract
The current protocol aims to showcase the technology integration, providing a detailed description of adopting the HealthCloud app, developed by the Healthy Landscape and Healthy People Lab, National Taiwan University (HLHP-NTU), on smartphones and smartwatches to collect data on users' real-time psychological and physiological responses and environmental information. A flexible and integrated research method was proposed because it can be difficult to measure multi-dimensional aspects of personal data in on-site studies in landscape and outdoor recreation research. An on-site study conducted in 2020 at the National Taiwan University campus was used as an application example. A dataset of 385 participants was used after excluding invalid samples. During the experiment, participants were asked to walk around campus for 30 min when their heart rate and psychological-scale items were measured, together with several environmental metrics. This work aimed to provide a possible solution to help on-site studies track real-time human responses that match ambient factors. Due to the app's flexibility, its use on wearable devices shows excellent potential for multidisciplinary research studies.
Introduction
Real-time data collection
In daily life, people benefit from the physical environment in many ways. For example, positive outcomes, such as psychological1 and heart rate restoration2 have been widely found. In addition, the relationships between ambient factors, such as temperature and humidity, and mental health have been discussed3,4. Studies have also explored the links between physiological and psychological responses, such as heart rate and stress5,6,....
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Protocol
The whole protocol follows the National Taiwan University Research Ethics Committee Office's instructions for conducting human-related experiments. During participant recruitment, candidates were informed of their instructions and rights and the experiment's risks in both speech and writing, and the signed consent forms were collected. The app can be installed on smartphones and smartwatches (see Table of Materials).
1. Preparation of the psychological and physiological experiment
- Obtain the information of the experimental sites for scheduling the activity.
- Design experimental procedur....
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Results
The original sample consisted of 423 individuals, of which 18 had to be excluded because of poor data quality due to instability of the beta version of the app and another 20 failed to complete all Pop Quiz questions. This led to an effective sample rate of 0.91. A dataset of 385 students (213 females, 172 males) from National Taiwan University were recruited. Participants were between 20-36 years old (M = 23.38, SD = 2.268). Regarding their psychological states, 514 ratings of preference (PREF, M =.......
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Discussion
Purposes of the study and significant findings
Wearable devices, such as smartphones and smartwatches, have been widely used to investigate physiological indicators or syndromes32,33,34, psychological states22,35; environmental information, or behaviors18,36. Most applications of smart devi.......
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Disclosures
The authors have nothing to disclose.
Acknowledgements
The Council of Agriculture of Taiwan funded the research project and the HealthCloud app development from 2018 to 2020 [109 agricultural science - 7.5.4-supplementary-#1(1)] ([109 
-7.5.4-
-#1(1)]).
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Materials
| Name | Company | Catalog Number | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Watch 6 | Apple | For the use of the HealthCloud app, such as Pop-up questions, heart rates measurement. | |
| iPhone | Apple | For the use of the HealthCloud app, such as GPS location collection, weather data colledction, data storage, data transfer. | |
| HealthCloud | Self-developed | The HealthCloud app, adopting Apple Watch and iPhone, was developed by Healthy Landscape and Healthy People Lab, National Taiwan University (HLHP-NTU) to track human responses. It adopted several APIs such as HealthKit, ResearchKit, Weather API and AppleWatch applications including Breathe app, and Blood Oxygen app to collect physiological status and psychological states, and environmental data in aims of further analyzing the relationships between human health and the environmental information. The link to the app in APP Store is as following: https://apps.apple.com/tw/app/healthcloud/id1446179518?l=en | |
| backend website | The backend website of HealthCloud app for the use of the configuration of the tasks, data exportation, and the display of users. http://healthcloud.hort.ntu.edu.tw/ | ||
| HealthKit | Apple | For the use of retrieving the data of physiological responses such as heart rate, heart rate variability, and blood oxygen saturation level. The link to the HealthKit: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/healthkit | |
| ResearchKit | Apple | This kit includes a variety of tasks for the use of research purposes. The functions adopted in HealthCloud app include Image Capture task, environment sound task, Stroop Test, to the Pop Questions of psychological state measurements such as perceived restorativeness scale, landscape preferences. The link to the ResearchKit: https://www.researchandcare.org/ | |
| Weather API | OpenWeather | For the use of collecting the real-time environmental data, including humidity, weather, global positioning system location, altitudes, etc., from the nearest weather station. The link to the Weather API: https://openweathermap.org/api | |
| Breathe app | Apple | For the use of assessing the real-time heart rate variability (HRV). This app was not included in the procedures of this pilot study. However, the HealthlCloud is now capable of retrieving the HRV data collected from Breathe app. The link to the Breathe app: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/breathe/id1459455352 | |
| Blood Oxygen app | Apple | For the use of assessing the real-time Blood Oxygen Concentration level (SpO2). The latest version of HealthlCloud is capable of retrieving the SpO2 data collected from app. This app was not included in the procedures of this pilot study. However, The measurement of Blood Oxygen app: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211027 The link to the Blood Oxygen app: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/breathe/id1459455352" | |
| IBM SPSS Statistics 25 | IBM | For the use of statistical analysis. The link to the Blood Oxygen app: https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/downloading-ibm-spss-statistics-25 |
References
- Purcell, T., Peron, E., Berto, R. Why do preferences differ between scene types. Environment and Behavior. 33 (1), 93-106 (2001).
- Engell, T., Lorås, H. W., Sigmundsson, H. Window view of nature after brief exercise improves choice reaction time and h....
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