Changing behaviours via self-tracking. Exploring the effect of psychological differences on system evaluations

The thesis explores subjective evaluations of self-tracking system users using a survey method. It aims to understand how the users experience the features of their self-selected systems, for example, credibility, goal achievement and dialogue with the system. These evaluations were analyzed using a few different angles, such as psychological characteristics of the users or social influence strategies. Features were analyzed also in terms of behaviour change theories.

Findings suggest that characteristics of the system users are affecting both the system selection and how they experience the system. The thesis derived design guidelines based on identified insights to help system designers to acknowledge the differences in users characteristics and to improve the effectiveness of behaviour change supporting features.