Activity trackers are indicators of their users’ fitness levels, but they could also flag aspects of city design that promote better health.
New York University researchers are inviting fitness enthusiasts to share their digital fitness logs with them, in a bid to reveal how exercise habits among city dwellers vary with seasons, and from weekdays to weekends, and if structures like public parks or running routes help establish a routine.
“Basically we are looking at how environment relates to how you exercise over time,” said Rumi Chunara, associate professor at NYU, who leads the study that began accepting participants today.
Chunara’s study will allow people who use the Boston-based app RunKeeper to share their data in an anonymized fashion with Chunara and her colleagues: inputting details like where they run, bike, or walk, and how far, for how long, and how that behavior changes from week to week. She hopes to get about 1,000 participants from a scattering of cities in the United States.
This will give the team a high-resolution picture of which public spaces correlate with what kind of exercise, as well as other health markers tracked by the app.
More www.betaboston.com
Ismailimail 