Fitbit, a trendy fitness-tracking device, is currently facing a class-action lawsuit accusing that some of their products aren’t working properly. Specifically, the Charge HR and Surge fitness watches are not accurately measuring users’ heart rates.
The lawsuit claims that Fitbit defrauded the public and cheated its customers by continuing to promote the heart rate monitoring feature and profiting significantly from it. To determine the details of the models in question, I looked them up on Fitbit’s official website. The Surge model tracks GPS, continuous heart rate, all-day activity statistics and sleep, and includes smart notifications and music control. It retails from the Fitbit website for $329.95.
In comparison, the Charge HR model tracks continuous heart rate, all-day activity stats and sleep, and includes caller ID. Its listed price on the Fitbit website is $199.95.
FitBit’s official website says that Fitbit collects all of this data on activity, exercise, food, weight and sleep in order to “help you find your fit, stay motivated, and see how small steps make a big impact.”
A healthy lifestyle is never a bad thing, and anything that helps people form and maintain healthier habits is hard to object to. On the other hand, the sheer amount of data collected by Fitbit, in my opinion, may keep users glued to the app that compiles all their data instead of helping them get out there and be active. I think that focusing on “small steps” makes goals easier, but when we get so caught up in the minutiae of how many steps we took in a day, we aren’t paying attention to the bigger trends. What does anyone do with this figure? Why do we need to know how many steps we took in a day? It may take me 100 steps to get from my office to the cafeteria, but are there really any significant health benefits to those steps?
Similarly, if there is a problem with your sleep—if you’re not getting enough, or it’s not good quality—your body will be able to tell you that with more certainty than numbers. The way you feel throughout the day will communicate, if you listen to your body, that you need more sleep.
The Fitbit sleep tracker works on an algorithm that detects a lack of movement for over an hour as an indication that you are asleep. It confirms this assumption by measuring movements consistent with sleep behaviour, such as rolling over. This results in false recordings of sleep, and my question becomes this: how does movement possibly indicate sleep quality? In my opinion, there is a connection to be made between technology and inactivity. Why do I need to walk across campus to ask my professor a question when I can just email her from where I’m sitting? I think the intention behind the Fitbit tracking is to bring these activity and health habits into the realm of the user’s awareness, in order to make more deliberate choices that are based on quantifiable evidence that is unique to that user. I think where it falls apart is on the end of the user, who has the opportunity to either disregard or rationalize their own data and continue in the habits that they have established anyway, or to become so obsessed with achieving the right number of steps in a day that they are not present for their actual lives.
My personal health philosophy is fairly holistic; I place importance on a mind-body connection that allows me to listen and respond to the natural cues of my body and not externally imposed rules (the infamous “Stand up now”). I don’t see a lot of value in quantifying every detail of my life, especially calories. I could be eating the recommended number of calories in a day, and Fitbit would think that I’m meeting my goals, but in reality I could be eating foods that are not nutritious or part of a balanced diet and ultimately having a negative impact on my health.
Bringing it all back around to the heart rate monitor, this information is primarily useful in exercise to determine if your heart is working at a rate that is safe. If you listen to your body, you can determine what is physical discomfort to persevere through, and what is pain indicating that you need to stop. In my opinion, Fitbit belongs to a particular brand of consumer capitalism that is teaching us not to listen to the best indicator of what our body needs: our body.