Sensing Health: Bodies, Data, and Digital Health Technologies

The concept of "health" emerges through an embodied experience of a digital health device or platform, not simply through the biomedical data it provides. Sensing Health: Bodies, Data, and Digital Health Technologies analyzes popular digital health technologies as aesthetic experiences to understand how these devices and platforms have impacted the way individuals perceive their bodies, behaviors, health, and wellbeing. By tracing design alongside embodied experiences of digital health, Kressbach shows how these technologies aim to quantify, track, and regulate the body, while at the same time producing moments that bring the body's affordances and relationship to the fore.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 302 pages
Publication date: 28 February 2024
Publisher: The University of Michigan Press

In the era of Apple Watches and Fitbits, the concept of "health" emerges through an embodied experience of a digital health device or platform, transcending mere biomedical data it provides. Sensing Health: Bodies, Data, and Digital Health Technologies delves into the realm of popular digital health technologies, exploring them as aesthetic experiences to understand their profound impact on individuals' perceptions of their bodies, behaviors, health, and well-being. By intertwining design with embodied experiences of digital health, author Kressbach unveils how these technologies strive to quantify, track, and regulate the body, while simultaneously foregrounding the body's inherent capabilities and its relationship to the world. This mediated experience of "health" presents an alternative to biomedical definitions that narrowly define health in opposition to illness.

To capture and analyze digital health experiences, Kressbach develops a method that blends descriptive practices from Film and Media Studies and Phenomenology. Through an in-depth examination of the design and feedback structures of digital health platforms and devices, the author employs her own first-person accounts to examine the profound impact of these technologies on her body, behaviors, and perception of health. Spanning five chapters dedicated to diverse categories of digital health, including menstrual trackers, sexual wellness technologies, fitness trackers, meditation and breathing technologies, and posture and running wearables, Sensing Health showcases a method of analysis that acknowledges and critiques the biomedical underpinnings of digital health technology while remaining attentive to the lived experiences of users. By focusing on the intersection of technological design and experience, this method offers valuable insights to researchers, scholars, designers, and developers alike.

Through Sensing Health, Kressbach invites us to reimagine the relationship between technology and health, challenging us to explore the ways in which digital health technologies shape our bodies, behaviors, and perceptions of well-being. By embracing a holistic approach that encompasses both the technical and experiential dimensions of these technologies, we can harness their potential to enhance our health and well-being in meaningful and transformative ways.

Weight: 634g
Dimension: 151 x 227 x 24 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780472056590