With the rise of wearable devices, personal quantification is easier than ever. It's not a surprise that self-tracking has a large adherence in a competitive, comparative culture where the individual is constantly improving his performance in every possible measure.

But it has a cost.

One of the responsibilities of product creators is to understand and examine the resultant behaviours that modifications to the product design will trigger. By adding certain features or changing their salience, you will inevitably change the behavioural dynamics.

It’s well studied that external rewards undermine intrinsic motivation, but now we know that the act of tracking can also impact it by reminding us of the output, making the activities seem like work. Thus, not everything that can be measured should be measured.

Peter Drucker said “What gets measured gets managed, even when it’s pointless to measure and manage it, and even if it harms the purpose of the organization to do so”.

It’s a warning from the father of management that it’s not often taken to heart, and this study reminds us of it.

With the rise of wearable devices, personal quantification is easier than ever. It's not a surprise that self-tracking has a large adherence in a competitive, comparative culture where the individual is constantly improving his performance in every possible measure.

But it has a cost.

One of the responsibilities of product creators is to understand and examine the resultant behaviours that modifications to the product design will trigger. By adding certain features or changing their salience, you will inevitably change the behavioural dynamics.

It’s well studied that external rewards undermine intrinsic motivation, but now we know that the act of tracking can also impact it by reminding us of the output, making the activities seem like work. Thus, not everything that can be measured should be measured.

Peter Drucker said “What gets measured gets managed, even when it’s pointless to measure and manage it, and even if it harms the purpose of the organization to do so”.

It’s a warning from the father of management that it’s not often taken to heart, and this study reminds us of it.

95 university students spent the day leisurely walking. In the measurement group they were given the choice to wear a pedometer. In the control group, everyone used a sealed shut pedometer. Afterwards, they rated how much they enjoyed walking.

Measuring led participants to walk more but decreased how much they enjoyed it – even for those who chose to be measured.

Consider what you want your users to feel.

While measurement may improve performance, it comes at the expense of enjoyment. By adding a measurement option, the behaviour will feel like work instead of fun.

Understand why users engage in an activity when deciding whether to measure it.

Sometimes the benefit of achieving more may outweigh the cost of users enjoying the experience. Does the end you’re looking to achieve justify the means of measuring its progress?

Switch the motivation type by becoming pro-social and giving meaning to the measurement.

For example: If you reduce your calories, you could send the equivalent of those excess calories to someone in need of food.

Prior data can set reference points that demotivate us

Our personal motivation can suffer in the face of prior data, setting unhelpful reference points about future expected efforts.

For instance, consider the following: "I can see that I ran 10k 3 times in a row, so if I don't run 10k this time, I feel that I'm doing worse. But I just don't feel like I can do 10k today, so I won't go at all."

However, in absolute terms, you're doing more in total by doing any more running at all, whether that's 1k, or even 100m, so you're best off ignoring the data and doing *something*.

A good counterbalance to this is to focus instead on the *experience* that running provides. This removes the quantifiable reference point and frees us to just enjoy the act for what it is. And who knows, maybe we'll end up running longer than 10k in the process!

• In the 1950s, Danny was drafted into the Israel Defence Forces in the psychology branch, creating methods to assess recruitment suitability.  

• From the late 60s, he worked with fellow academic and best friend Amos Tversky. 1971-81 were the peak years of research output for the ‘dynamic duo’, including on the Availability and Anchoring shortcuts.

• In ’74, they published the important Judgement Under Uncertainty paper on biases and shortcuts, which started the wave of rational thinking as something unrealistic, impacting psychology, economics and philosophy. 

“Thinking, Fast and Slow is an interesting capstone to his career, but his accomplishments were solidified well in advance of writing it. They’d be just as significant without it.” 

- Steven Pinker on Daniel

• In ’79, Danny and Amos created Prospect Theory - with its “meaningless yet distinctive name” and initial discovery of Loss Aversion.

• In ’81, they created Framing suggesting that choices are merely mental representations open to intepretation and not set in stone. 

• Defined Peak End Rule with the famous colonoscopy study.

• In 2002, won the Nobel Prize for Economics for work with Tversky and later winner Richard Thaler that combined psychology with economics.

• He also furthered and then popularized Dual System Theory (Fast and Slow Thinking) in his best-selling book, Thinking, Fast and Slow in 2011.

• In the 1950s, Danny was drafted into the Israel Defence Forces in the psychology branch, creating methods to assess recruitment suitability.  

• From the late 60s, he worked with fellow academic and best friend Amos Tversky. 1971-81 were the peak years of research output for the ‘dynamic duo’, including on the Availability and Anchoring shortcuts.

• In ’74, they published the important Judgement Under Uncertainty paper on biases and shortcuts, which started the wave of rational thinking as something unrealistic, impacting psychology, economics and philosophy. 

“Thinking, Fast and Slow is an interesting capstone to his career, but his accomplishments were solidified well in advance of writing it. They’d be just as significant without it.” 

- Steven Pinker on Daniel

• In ’79, Danny and Amos created Prospect Theory - with its “meaningless yet distinctive name” and initial discovery of Loss Aversion.

• In ’81, they created Framing suggesting that choices are merely mental representations open to intepretation and not set in stone. 

• Defined Peak End Rule with the famous colonoscopy study.

• In 2002, won the Nobel Prize for Economics for work with Tversky and later winner Richard Thaler that combined psychology with economics.

• He also furthered and then popularized Dual System Theory (Fast and Slow Thinking) in his best-selling book, Thinking, Fast and Slow in 2011.