Encouraging Physical Activity

with Technology

Jamie Wise

Marcy Vance

Krista KinnardNutrition and Physical Activity Group (NPA)

Office of Arid

Lands Studies

Arizona Space Grant ConsortiumUniversity of Arizona

April 19, 2008

Outline

• Jamie Wise– Assessing the Potential Role of GPS and GIS

• Marcy Vance– Accuracy of Commercial GPS Energy

Expenditure Products

• Krista Kinnard– Integrating GPS and GIS in Education

Programs

A special thanks to…

• Kay Hongu, Ph.D. (mentor)• Barron Orr, Ph.D. (co-mentor)• Kristin Wisneski• Karalee Poschman• The Nutritional Sciences Department• Office of Arid Lands Studies• East Social Center of Green Valley, AZ• Ironwood Tree Experience

Assessing the Potential Role of GPS and GIS

Jamie Wise

Obesity Statistics

2005 NIH, WHO, US Dept. of Health and Human Services, National Center for Health Statistics, US Surgeon General National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1999-2002 and 1988-1994

An increase of 45%

The Age of Technology

• Video games, TV, computer games, the internet

• Sedentary activity rather than physical activity

• Obesity is a national epidemic

Proposed Solution: Combine healthy lifestyle education with geospatial technologies

• Global Positioning System (GPS): location outside• Geographic Information System (GIS): computer mapping• Google Maps & Google Earth: web visualization & simple GIS

GPSComputers, video games, etc.

Technology(Measurements)

Technology(fun)

Active/ outsideSedentary/

inside

GPS:1.Measures2.Fun

Why GPS?

• If youth love technology, can we exploit technology that:

• Is used outside?• And that can

actually help us measure PA?

• AND – that is FUN!

GPS and Energy

GPS Satellites

GPS receiver

Accurate? We don’t know!!

Measures Location (latitude/longitude)

Commercial Fitness Units(that exploit GPS)

Accurate? YES!!

Measures Energy Expenditure (EE) in

Calories (kcals)

GP

S T

ech

no

log

y

Accuracy of Commercial Energy Expenditure Products that Exploit GPS

Marcy Vance

The Next Step

• Design an experiment• Identify a control for

measuring EE: RT3 tri-accelerometer

• Use tools to structure PA (metronome, GPSMap60, pedometer)

• Develop a detailed protocol

• Compare RT3 data to commercial fitness units

Controls

• RT3– Measures 3 dimensional movement– Reports energy expenditure every minute

• Garmin GPS Map60– GPS receiver to verify location– Helped us control speed– Takes waypoints to synchronize data to GPS units

and RT3.

• Metronome – Used to keep cadence with desired speed

Pre- and In-Field Preparation

Pre-Field Preparation • Prepare Units

• What to Bring to Field

In-Field Preparation • Metronome

• Field Unit Preparation

At the Field Procedure

• In the Field

•Start Procedure

• Walking/Running Speeds: 3,5,7,10,12 km/h

• Waypoints

• Record

• After the Experiment

• Immediate data download, clean analyze

Trial and Error

Changes:

-Time vs. Distance

- Change start/stop procedure

- Changed Speeds

- Established a way to organize field data during the process

What worked:

-One person wearing all the units

- Metronome to keep cadence

- Marking waypoints as a control

Our objective was to create a repeatable, robust experiment and eliminate (or reduce) confounding factors.

Why?

• Protocol significance

•Reproducibility

• Application of results

• New trials planned to test the protocol and complete the experiment

Integrating GPS and GIS in Education Programs

Krista Kinnard

Community Involvement

– Get kids involved with technology while keeping them outside and moving around.

– Promote physical activity to prevent obesity– Make that activity sustained in the longer term– Set up a prevention program – Inform others with newsletters and updates.

Goals

Never Participate in

Obesity Prevention Intervention

Attempted Intervention but Not Sustained

Successful Intervention

Programs have been established to educate

and encourage PA and nutritious

lifestyles

Direct Intervention Efforts

70%

20%

10%

Tho

se a

t R

isk

of O

verw

eigh

t or

Obe

sity

NOT Acceptable!

Walk Across Arizona• WAAZ is a 16 week program promoting daily physical activity

• Weekly newsletters

• County by County “Fun Places to Walk” public Google Map

Green Valley WAAZ: Geocaching

• Green Valley WAAZ wrap-up event

• WAAZ totals: – 30 min. scavenger hunt

using Garmin GPS map60

– 16 adult participants – walked almost 1 mile

• 75% of participants reported a positive experience

Green Valley WAAZ: Geocaching

• Green Valley WAAZ wrap-up event

• WAAZ totals: – 30 min. scavenger hunt

using Garmin GPS map60

– 16 adult participants – walked almost 1 mile

• 75% of participants reported a positive experience

Ironwood Tree Experience• A program aimed at reconnecting

youth with nature• They contacted us about using GPS

to help measure things in the environment (e.g., location of plants)

• They are interested in the connection between healthy environment and healthy lifestyles

• We helped them make this connection more direct

• We have integrated physical activity into the program through:– Use of pedometers– Use of GPS and GIS– Use of new web visualization technologies

Ironwood Tree Experience• Taught the youth way to take GPS-based field

measurements into the laboratory for spatial analysis• Introduced Google Maps & Google Earth so they

could share their results with parents and the public

Our longer term objective is to integrate our research AND education programs:

Measure potential of PA/EE measurements based on our research, and assessment of whether geospatial technologies encourage PA.

The Future

• GPS research:– Using the protocol to

further study GPS units

• Implementation of community intervention projects like WAAZ and ITE—Get people moving!!

The Future

• Integrating technology into currently lifestyles in a way that encourages PA.

• Cell phones with GPS enabled

• MySpace and Facebook with “My Activities Maps” spreading across social networks

Thank you

Questions?