🔗 Share this article

A sense of building tension. Visible is the frosty air coming from my rivals as they perform the "pre-race" shuffle on the beginning point.

A swift twitch of the hips.

I'm participating in my local 5km community parkrun and I'm serious. Three, two, one...

Oh, hang on. I have to sort my tracker. As does the guy next to me.

The person waiting tuts. I won't start until… done! Signal acquired, and I'm running.

Amidst the crowd, it's hard to see a person without a wearable on it. And this isn't only us runners who use them.

We're witnessing a thriving, multi-billion dollar market. Names like Garmin lead the market, each with an extensive range of different models to suit a range of needs. Based on how advanced the device you select, price tags can vary between £100 to a significant investment.

"I find it infuriating, I can't switch off."

"It comforts me… It's like a friend guiding me."

"I wish it wouldn't say I've had a poor sleep."

Just some of the reactions I've had from other smartwatch wearers when I question what they think of theirs.

A Sea of Statistics

My current opinion on mine? At this moment, irritating. It's telling me I'm off pace, causing me to question whether the trees I'm running below are interfering with my satellite signal.

A vast number of us fasten these small monitors onto our wrists and keep them on constantly, ostensibly at ease with the fact they're continuously tracking us.

Gone are the days when we used them only to give us an idea of our daily steps. Now, they can track our sleep patterns, heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), our recovery score.

It's difficult to find a bodily function they don't track.

But can they do what they advertise? And are the statistics we scrutinise a faithful picture of our actual health? Do they enhance our daily wellness, or do the plethora of readings and motivational messages just add to our everyday anxiety?

Addiction or Aid?

"I do get a a little fixated with mine," an individual admits.

While she values how her device monitors her workouts, she finds some of its other capabilities "excessive" at times - a feeling that became apparent during a significant period.

Prior to discovering she could put it into a specific mode, her smartwatch kept telling her she was being insufficiently active enough. In a new phase, the watch insists her she's had a bad night's sleep.

"I am caring for a six-month old, I don't need to be notified I'm tired," she says. "That fact is all too clearly."

Couldn't she just take it off?

"I suppose I could, theoretically, but I've got this push-pull dynamic with it," she continues. "I love it for its workout tracking, I just wonder whether the additional features it can now do is possibly excessive for me."

Inside the Device

Each model of smartwatch has its own unique way of monitoring your health metrics and interpreting your data, but the vast bulk use sensors on the back of the watch.

They typically shine minute LED lights onto your skin which can observe blood flow, recording your BPM. Higher-end devices measure changes in the skin conductance that passes over the skin to gauge your stress levels.

The Professional Viewpoint

A professor says that overall for smartwatches, it's a "difficult line" - while the ever-evolving tech could potentially prevent illness, "detecting disease before we notice anything", it could also turn us watch wearers into the "worried well".

He points out that newer wearables can carry out tests like heart rhythm analysis, which constantly monitor how healthy the heart is. They can alert if someone is experiencing atrial fibrillation (AF), where there is abnormal signals in the heart causing an uneven pulse.

This does not automatically signal someone is on the verge of a heart attack, but it can give an early warning they might be more susceptible of a stroke in the years to come.

But how to make sense of these readings is not straightforward. The expert fears that as further capabilities are added, people may find it hard to fully comprehend their data.

"I have some doubts that being able to monitor so many things is such a positive development," he says.

A health researcher focusing on cardiology agrees. Her work into the influence of wearable tech on a specific group of cardiovascular patients suggested a noticeable percentage of those who were given devices to monitor their condition experienced increased anxiety and were "more inclined to use healthcare resources".

She observed a pattern with her patients - they noticed a worrying figure on their watch. They became worried. Their pulse went up. They got more worried. They looked a second time, and their anxiety rose further.

"Upon viewing stats about ourselves that we can't properly interpret then, understandably, we are going to become concerned," the psychologist says. "We check, we check again - it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy."