What question did this study set out to answer?

Aim to analyze the ethical and legal implications of self-tracking technologies, especially in sports science.

April 17, 20260 citationsOpen Access

A Short Commentary On: “Would John Dewey wear a Fitbit? A pragmatist analysis of self-tracking technologies’ impact on habit formation”

JSJ. Sikra DDDiana Dimitrova LSLea S. Singson

Key Points

Aim to analyze the ethical and legal implications of self-tracking technologies, especially in sports science.
Review of existing literature on wearable devices and their applications in research
Critical analysis of ethical and philosophical concerns related to personal data processing
Discussion of the commercial motivations behind wearable production
Identified numerous ethical, legal, and philosophical concerns related to wearable devices
Highlighted that commercial motivations may overshadow research benefits
Encouraged a critical perspective towards the use of wearables in sports science research

Abstract

Within the Digitalisation and Transformation of Research (DiTraRe) project, Razum et al. 1 postulate that sports science research data fall under numerous legal and ethical precautions. These precautions apply, e.g. to the processing of personal data by wearable devices such as Apple Watches and applications such as MyFitnessPal when processed for research purposes 2. Whilst wearable devices have their benefits for sports science research, we believe that it is important to approach them from the standpoint of a critical friend. This is because we consider the production of wearables to be mainly commercially, rather than research, motivated, and for this reason many ethical, legal and philosophical concerns have not been addressed.

KI fragen

Bookmark

View Full Paper