Activity Guidance
The primary goal of the Activity Guidance insight is to increase fitness while preventing injury. To do this, our algorithms focus on identifying significant physiological patterns (via trends in heart rate and HRV metrics), taking into account where the user is in their fitness journey.
The Activity Guidance insight is a weekly insight providing guidance to the user on whether they should maintain their activity level, increase activity to increase fitness, or decrease activity to prevent injury or health ramifications.
The main conditions we are identifying from physiological patterns are:
- The user is coping well with their activity load and/or other physiological stressors.
- The user is entering into an early state of fatigue or having trouble adapting to their activity load and/or other stressors.
- The user is entering into a state of severe physiological stress.
- The user has no significant physiological changes.
These physiological conditions are contextualized by the user’s activity level as well as both short-term and long-term activity trends to inform the best activity guidance for that user.
For the activity guidance insights, we use up to 6 weeks of activity data to determine short-term and long-term trends of activity load as well as to classify the user based on general activity level (sedentary/low activity, moderate activity, and high activity). Along with the activity data, we use up to 4 weeks of heart rate variability (HRV) and resting heart rate (RHR) data looking for specific patterns in a user’s personal physiological trends in response to their recent activity levels.
As we cannot verify if a user's recorded activity data is complete, we the Activity Guidance insight assumes that we are receiving complete activity data.
Input | Description |
ibi | An array for inter-beat intervals; at minimum, 60 inter-beat (R-R) intervals are required. |
activity | An array of objects, each object containing information on daily activity including daily step count, type of activity, duration of activity, intensity of activity |
- Minimum of 4 days of HRV readings in order to return a weekly Activity Guidance Insight (otherwise will return insufficient data).
- Activity data, including:
- Step count and/or a summary of non-exercise activity level
- Exercise/activity type (i.e. running, swimming, strength)
- Exercise/activity duration or activity start and end times
- Exercise/activity intensity via exercise heart rate data or other specified exercise intensity or load marker
Note: Updated input format details for activity data coming soon.
The Activity Guidance insight is a weekly insight providing guidance to the user on whether they should maintain their activity level, increase activity to increase fitness, or decrease activity to prevent injury or health ramifications.
For periods when the user has not recorded sufficient HRV data in order to do meaningful trending, we use the user’s general activity level (recent activity data and daily steps data) alongside HRV population classifiers to provide more conservative/general guidance.
The outputs include context of recent user activity trends in order to provide more granular messaging to the user.
Output | Definition | Example User Text |
0 | Insufficient data | More data is needed to start calibrating your activity and exercise. |
1 | Maintain current level of activity. User recently increased activity. | Great job recently increasing your activity! Try to keep up the same routine now without increasing or decreasing too much. |
2 | Maintain current level of activity. User recently decreased activity. | You recently reduced your activity and your body seems to be appreciating the extra rest. Try keeping this routine for a while before making more changes. |
3 | Maintain current level of activity. User either increased or decreased activity. | Your body is responding well to your current exercise schedule. Keep it up if it’s feeling good to you! |
4 | Maintain current level of activity with caution. Prioritize recovery activities. User’s recent activity was stable. | You’ve been balancing activity and rest pretty well recently. Keep it up, but pay attention to how your body feels. |
5 | Maintain current level of activity with caution. Prioritize recovery activities. User recently increased activity. | Great job recently increasing your activity! Try to keep your routine, but don’t be afraid to ease up on the intensity if you’re feeling tired. |
6 | Maintain current level of activity with caution. Prioritize recovery activities. User recently decreased activity. | Your body seems to be appreciating the extra rest. Keep up your current activity levels and make sure to stay hydrated and prioritize sleep. |
7 | Gradually increase activity level (volume and/or intensity). User recently increased activity. | Full steam ahead! Continue gradually increasing your activity levels like you have been recently. |
8 | Gradually increase activity level (volume and/or intensity). User recently decreased activity. | Rest and recovery seems to be going well. Consider increasing your activity levels a bit this week for better fitness and health. |
9 | Gradually increase activity level (volume and/or intensity). User’s recent activity was stable. | You’ve been putting in some work, and your body seems ready for a little more. Consider a gradual increase in activity this week! |
10 | Reduce level of activity (volume and/or intensity). Prioritize recovery. User recently increased activity. | Your body seems to need more rest. To prevent injury or fatigue, consider reducing your activity intensity and/or volume and prioritize restful activities. |
11 | Reduce level of activity (volume and/or intensity). Prioritize recovery. User recently decreased activity. | You reduced your activity recently, and your body seems to need even more rest. Consider reducing your activity intensity or volume and prioritize recovery activities. |
12 | Reduce level of activity (volume and/or intensity). Prioritize recovery. User’s recent activity was stable. | You’ve been putting in the work. Now it’s time to put in the rest. Try prioritizing walking, stretching, or other low intensity movements along with plenty of rest. |
13 | Increase low intensity exercise. No trending data available. | Research shows that frequent low intensity movement like walking, yoga, or bodyweight exercise improves health and cognition. Remember, the habit is more important than the specific exercise! |
14 | Focus on low intensity activity over high intensity activities. No trending data available. | To increase your overall resilience and fitness, consider replacing some of the high intensity activity in your routine with some lower intensity functional fitness exercises. |
15 | No guidance yet. No trending data available. | Keep up your activity. As you collect more data, guidance will automatically show up here in a week or so. |
16 | Maintain current level of activity with caution. Prioritize recovery activities. User either recently increased or decreased. | It’s important to balance activity with rest and recovery. Do what feels right this week, leaning towards lower intensity and more restful activities. |