Arlene Ducao came to QS from using the WiFit to track personal metrics. As a researcher and maker she started to apply the lessons from self-tracking to another one of her interests, cycling. As a frequent bike ride she started with simple customizations like adding LEDs to her helmet. When consumer EEG devices came on…
Like many of us, Michael Cohn had a hard time “rationally regulating” his behavior. Even as a psychology researcher at UCSF, he was falling victim to procrastination and time wasting. He started exploring “irrationally regulating” his behavior by stating personal commitment contacts then using self-tracking via spreadsheets to understand how he spends his time and…
Rosane Oliveiria is a researcher and scholar that focuses on integrative medicine, genomics, and nutrition. She’s also an identical twin. In 2012 she was struck by the different patterns of weight fluctuations that she and her sister, Renata, had been experiencing. Using historical data and medical records she was able to go back in time…
Maria Benet began tracking her activity a few years ago as a way to lose weight and take control of her health. What started with a simple pedometer and a few custom Access databases has morphed into a multi-year tracking project that includes news apps and tools. Her progress and data has even spurred her…
Joris Janssen is a researcher who’s focused his work on combining sensing algorithms with psychological insights. Currently he’s a researcher and developer at Sense Observation Systems, a Netherlands-based company developing context-aware computing. In this talk, filmed at the Amsterdam QS meetup group, Joris gives a brief explanation of the work they do at SenseOS, then…
Eric Jain stumbled upon a study published in 2013 that found the a full moon was associated with less sleep. Being an avid self-tracker and a toolmaker he decided to find out if that was true for him as well. Eric used his tool, Zenobase, to import, aggregate, filter, and then analyze his sleep data…
The excellent organizers of the London Quantified Self Show&Tell recently fielded a detailed survey about the self-tracking practices in their group. In the video below Ulrich Atz presents their findings. Some of the interesting results from the survey: 105 respondents (22 identified as female, 76 as male). Over 500 unique tools were being used. 47% of…
It’s an iterative process. I’m peeling an onion, and I can continue peeling that onion for the probably the rest of my life. How many times have you sneezed today? This month? Over the last 3 years? Thomas Christiansen knows his sneeze count because he’s been tracking them since 2011. We’ve actually heard from Thomas…
Nancy Dougherty has talked to us in the past about her experiences with exploring self-tracking and how mindfulness interacts with the technological processes of gathering and understanding personal data. In this short Ignite talk, given at the 2013 Quantified Self Global Conference, Nancy digs a bit deeper into her personal experiences when she gave up…
Max Gotzler was smack dab in the middle of a long Berlin winter and he started experiencing reductions in this mood, energy levels, and sleep. After getting a blood test he found out he had low levels of vitamin D and testosterone (among other biomarkers). His prior reading and research led him to experimenting with…
Mark Drangsholt has been dealing with an issue with his heart since he was a young man. Since his early twenties, when he as diagnosed with paroxysmal atrial tachycardia he’s had to deal with irregular heart rhythms. In this talk Mark explains how the transition into adulthood negatively impacted his health and then how he…
In order to manage his psoriasis, Ian Eslick used a self-tracking technique of making mental notes to himself on triggers and symptom severity. Surprisingly, Ian found that these mental models actually informed more consistent and rigorous tracking methods. In this talk, Ian describes his research on exploring how to help people create and engage with personal experimentation.
We’ve all come face to face with tracking some aspect of our life only to realize that we’re not quite sure how to get started. Enrico Bertini encountered this roadblock when he began thinking about tracking the amount of time he spends engaging in “focused work.” As an information visualization researcher at NYU he decided…
A big piece of our work at QS Labs is supporting our worldwide community through the over 100 Quantified Self Meetups (see our sidebar at right). At our local meetup in the Bay Area, and others we’ve had the pleasure of visiting, we are consistently observing that nearly half of the attendees are new to…
“If I look at this, I have these memories, and I remember this was a good year.” Collect it and forget it. This could be be hidden mantra of many people engaged with self-tracking, myself included. I will readily admit to buying a device or application with the hope that I can collect enough information…
Science. Someone makes an observation, creates a hypothesis, tests it, then analyzes the results against the hypothesis. Hopefully once a conclusion is reached it is tested again and again for validity and reproducibility. With self-tracking, the world of personal science and experimentation is opening up real-world personal laboratories to test the findings, claims, and promises…
In this short talk Bethany Soule, founder of Beeminder, a goal setting and commitment tool, describes what happened when they started using it to “mind” the development of the service itself.
There are no shortage of apps and devices to track our various physical activities. Going for run? A few laps at the pool? An early morning hike? All of these are trackable with data delivered and archived in a variety of different ways. Mike McDearmon loves to get outdoors, and he also loves tracking his…
Kevin Krejci was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease last year. At a recent Bay Area QS Meetup, Kevin shared his story of how he’s using self-tracking applications and devices to help him monitor different symptoms and outcomes related to his diagnosis. Watch his talk below to hear about his triumphs and challenges.
Rob Rothfarb has an artificial aortic heart valve. It requires him to take anticoagulation therapy so that he reduces his risk of blood clots. It also requires constant monitoring to ensure that he is within target ranges. Rob learned that different lifestyle factors and genetic susceptibility was related to how effective his therapy was so…
