Is It Possible I'm Dependent on This Smartwatch?

A sense of building tension. Visible is the frosty air coming from my fellow runners as they execute the "about to run" wiggle on the start line.

A swift flick of the hips.

I'm lined up for my local 5km community parkrun and I mean business. The countdown begins...

Wait a second. I have to start my device. As does the person beside me.

The person waiting sighs. I won't start until… there! GPS ready, and I'm running.

In the mele, it's difficult to see a person without a fitness tracker on it. And it's not just us athletes who wear them.

This is a thriving, multi-billion pound sector. Brands like Garmin dominate, all offering an wide range of diverse devices to fit a range of lifestyles. Based on how high tech the watch you go for, price tags can vary between an affordable sum to a significant investment.

"I find it infuriating, it's impossible to switch off."

"It reassures me… It's like a companion supporting me."

"Stop telling me I've experienced a poor sleep."

A handful of the responses people have shared from other tracker enthusiasts when I question what they think of theirs.

The Monitoring Conundrum

My current opinion on mine? Right now, frustrating. It's telling me I'm not hitting my target, making me wonder whether the overhead branches I'm passing under are blocking my location tracking.

Countless individuals of us fasten these little monitors onto our arms and keep them on all day and night, ostensibly comfortable with the fact they're perpetually monitoring us.

A distant memory are the days when we depended on them solely to give us an rough count of our pedometer reading. Today, they can track our sleep patterns, blood pressure, heart rate variability (HRV), our recovery score.

It's tricky to find a bodily function they aren't designed to measure.

But do they do what they say they do? And are the data points we obsess over a true reflection of our actual health? Do they enhance our overall health, or do the multitude of measurements and motivational messages just increase our sense of overwhelm?

A Complicated Bond

"I do get a a little obsessed with mine," an individual reveals.

While she appreciates how her device monitors her workouts, she finds some of its other functions "daunting" at times - a feeling first discovered during a significant period.

Prior to discovering she could put it into a specific mode, her smartwatch kept telling her she was being insufficiently energetic enough. In a new phase, the watch frequently reports her she's had a restless night.

"I have a young baby, there's no point to be informed I've not slept," she says. "I know that perfectly well."

Couldn't she just take it off?

"I could, perhaps, but I have this love-hate relationship with it," she explains. "I value it for its fitness insights, I sometimes question whether the myriad other functions it can now do is perhaps overkill for me."

How Do They Work?

Each model of smartwatch has its own novel way of monitoring your bodily functions and interpreting your data, but the majority use detectors on the reverse of the watch.

They usually project minute LED lights onto your arm which can observe blood flow, recording your heartbeat. Sophisticated devices analyse changes in the electrical current that flows through the skin to get an idea of your stress levels.

Expert Perspectives

A professor says that for most people for smartwatches, it's a "delicate equilibrium" - while the rapidly advancing tech could realistically aid early diagnosis, "identifying issues before we feel unwell", it could also turn us the tracked into the "worried well".

He points out that newer wearables can conduct tests like medical-grade monitoring, which regularly monitor how healthy the heart is. They can notify if someone is experiencing a heart arrhythmia, where there is abnormal electrical activity in the heart causing an irregular heartbeat.

This does not mean someone is imminently going to suffer a cardiac event, but it can give an advance notice they might be more at risk of a stroke in the long term.

But how to understand these numbers is complex. The expert concerns that as further capabilities are added, people may find it hard to fully comprehend their data.

"I'm not entirely convinced that being able to monitor so many metrics is such a positive development," he says.

A health researcher studying wearable tech agrees. A study into the effect of wearable tech on a cohort of heart condition patients suggested a minority of those who were given devices to monitor their cardiac function experienced greater stress and were "far more likely to use healthcare resources".

She observed a pattern with her patients - they spotted a concerning reading on their watch. They grew concerned. Their pulse increased. They got increasingly anxious. They checked again, and their anxiety went up again.

"Upon viewing data about ourselves that we can't properly interpret then, naturally, we are going to become concerned," the psychologist says. "We monitor, we obsess - it becomes a vicious cycle."