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When it comes to fitness trackers, the psychology behind them is just as important as the technology inside them.

Gadgets like the Nike+ FuelBand, Fitbit Ultra and BodyMedia Fit Linkuse accelerometers, altimeters and algorithms to track everything from how many steps you took to how many calories you burned. By providing this data instantaneously, and in some cases allowing you to share it via social media, they do more than inform. They reinforce, motivate and reward by turning exercise into a game.

Motivating couch potatoes and providing everyday athletes with data will be an increasingly lucrative business as so-called wearable computing devices like fitness trackers take off. Companies like Nike, Adidas and Motorola are expected to ship 90 million wearables by 2017, according to ABI Research.

Forrester Research is equally bullish, noting in a report this week that wearables are the next wave of consumer technology product innovation and companies like Adidas, Nike and Under Armour should work alongside the likes of Apple, Google and Facebook to maximize their potential.

How these devices work is a straightforward technological issue. Why they work delves into two important facets of activity: measurement and motivation. To know whether youre getting better at something, you need data. As physicist Lord Kelvin said, If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it. Once youve got data, you need specific goals or standards to provide the sense of accomplishment that will make you work harder.

One of the best things fitness trackers do is provide an objective measure of activity, said John Bartholomew, a kinesiology and health education professor at the University of Texas at Austin. The truth is, people are lousy at accurately judging their level of physical activity. Few people have any idea how many calories theyve burned running for the train or walking to work. Others spend, say, half an hour on the treadmill each day and consider themselves active. And still more promise theyll get active but fall short.

By having this sort of equipment and this sort of technology, it allows you to actually track and look back to see how active you actually are, Bartholomew said. You cant lie to yourself.

Once youve established an exercise routine and have a realistic idea of what youre doing each day, fitness trackers delve further into your psyche by motivating you. The routine things you do each day climbing stairs, schlepping groceries, pushing the lawnmower are cast in a new light. Suddenly, theyre exercise. They always were, of course, but fitness trackers drive the point home by telling you just how many calories you burned raking the lawn. As a result, exercise becomes something you seek to interject into your life, a goal-directed activity that brings a sense of accomplishment. Every goal you reach Today I hit 12,000 steps! pushes you to do better next time.

Theres incredible power in knowing how youre doing, Stefan Olander, v.p. of digital sport at Nike, said in a discussion at South by Southwest. Its inherently, incredibly motivational.

That motivation is amplified by the ability to broadcast your results via social media. Posting your stats to Facebook and Twitter lets you do more than boast. It allows others to encourage you or even join you in working toward similar goals like running a marathon. Youre part of a community, which makes it that much harder to slack off.

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Fitness Trackers Use Psychology to Motivate Couch Potatoes

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