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Authors thank Aliisa Hatten for the English revision. This study is part of the doctoral thesis of Carolina Casado-Robles, as well as of the WearFit project (Reference: B-SEJ-029-UGR18) , funded by the FEDER/Regional Government of Andalusia-Ministry of Economy and Knowledge. The ex-periments complied with the current laws of the country in which they were performed. The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare. The datasets generated and analyzed during the current study are not publicly available, but are available from the corresponding author who was an organizer of the study.

Analysis of institutional authors

Guijarro-Romero, SantiagoCorresponding Author
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Article

ARE WRIST-WORN ACTIVITY TRACKERS AND MOBILE APPLICATIONS VALID FOR ASSESSING PHYSICAL ACTIVITY IN HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS? WEARFIT STUDY

Publicated to:Journal of Sports Science and Medicine. 21 (3): 356-375 - 2022-07-21 21(3), DOI: 10.52082/jssm.2022.356

Authors: Viciana, Jesus; Casado-Robles, Carolina; Guijarro-Romero, Santiago; Mayorga-Vega, Daniel

Affiliations

Univ Granada, Dept Phys Educ & Sport, Granada, Spain - Author
Univ Malaga, Fac Ciencias Educ, Dept Didact Lenguas Artes & Deporte, Malaga, Spain - Author
Univ Valladolid, Dept Didact Mus Plast & Corporal Express, Valladolid, Spain - Author

Abstract

The purpose was to examine the validity of three wrist-worn com-mercial activity trackers (Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2, Ap-ple Watch Series 5, and Xiaomi Mi Band 5) and six mobile apps (Pedometer and Pacer for android and iPhone mobiles, Google Fit for android, and Apple Health for iPhone mobiles) for estimating high school students??? steps and physical activity (PA) under free-living conditions. A sample of 56 (27 females; mean age = 14.7 years) and 51 (25 females; mean age = 14.0 years) high school students participated in Study 1 and 2, respectively. Study 1: Stu-dents performed a 200-meter course in four different conditions while wearing the wearables. Step counting through a video rec-ord was used as the golden standard. Study 2: Students wore the three wrist-worn commercial activity trackers during the waking time of one day, considering ActiGraph model wGT3X-BT ac-celerometers as a standard of reference. Afterward, the agreement between the PA scores measured by the commercial activity trackers and the video (study 1) or accelerometers (study 2) were calculated as follows: Equivalence test, Limits of Agreement (LOA); Mean Absolute Error (MAE); Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE); and Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC). Re-sults showed that all the wearables presented excellent validity for assessing steps in structured free-living conditions (study 1; MAPE < 5%), although their validity was between poor-excellent based on ICC (95% confidence interval) values (ICC = 0.56-1.00). Regarding Study 2, the Xiaomi wristband and the Samsung Watch presented acceptable-excellent (MAPE = 9.4-11.4%; ICC = 0.91-0.97) validity for assessing steps under unstructured free-living conditions (study 2). However, the Apple Watch presented questionable-excellent validity (MAPE = 18.0%; ICC = 0.69-0.95). Regarding moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA) and total PA, only the Apple Watch showed low-acceptable validity for MAPE value and questionable-excellent validity for the ICC val-ues for MVPA assessment (MAPE = 22.6; ICC = 0.67-0.93). All wearables checked in this study have shown adequate validity re-sults in order to assess steps in both structured and unstructured free-living conditions for both continuous and dichotomous vari-ables. Moreover, for assessing MVPA, only the Apple Watch re-ported valid results for compliance or non-compliance with the daily PA recommendations. However, the results showed low va-lidity for total PA and MVPA as continuous variables. In conclu-sion, depending on the user???s/researcher???s aim and context, one or another wearable activity tracker could be more adequate, mainly because of its valid measurements and its costs.

Keywords
AccelerometerAccuracyActivity monitorAdolescentsAged childrenAgreementCalibratioConsumer-wearablesDaily stepsEnergy-expenditurePhysical activity recommendationsReliabilitySchoolchildreSchoolchildrenSedentary behaviorStatistical-methodsValidity

Quality index

Bibliometric impact. Analysis of the contribution and dissemination channel

The work has been published in the journal Journal of Sports Science and Medicine due to its progression and the good impact it has achieved in recent years, according to the agency Scopus (SJR), it has become a reference in its field. In the year of publication of the work, 2022, it was in position , thus managing to position itself as a Q1 (Primer Cuartil), in the category Physical Therapy, Sports Therapy and Rehabilitation.

From a relative perspective, and based on the normalized impact indicator calculated from World Citations provided by WoS (ESI, Clarivate), it yields a value for the citation normalization relative to the expected citation rate of: 8.33. This indicates that, compared to works in the same discipline and in the same year of publication, it ranks as a work cited above average. (source consulted: ESI Nov 14, 2024)

This information is reinforced by other indicators of the same type, which, although dynamic over time and dependent on the set of average global citations at the time of their calculation, consistently position the work at some point among the top 50% most cited in its field:

  • Weighted Average of Normalized Impact by the Scopus agency: 6.21 (source consulted: FECYT Feb 2024)
  • Field Citation Ratio (FCR) from Dimensions: 7.65 (source consulted: Dimensions May 2025)

Specifically, and according to different indexing agencies, this work has accumulated citations as of 2025-05-02, the following number of citations:

  • WoS: 19
  • Scopus: 18
  • OpenCitations: 16
Impact and social visibility

From the perspective of influence or social adoption, and based on metrics associated with mentions and interactions provided by agencies specializing in calculating the so-called "Alternative or Social Metrics," we can highlight as of 2025-05-02:

  • The use, from an academic perspective evidenced by the Altmetric agency indicator referring to aggregations made by the personal bibliographic manager Mendeley, gives us a total of: 62.
  • The use of this contribution in bookmarks, code forks, additions to favorite lists for recurrent reading, as well as general views, indicates that someone is using the publication as a basis for their current work. This may be a notable indicator of future more formal and academic citations. This claim is supported by the result of the "Capture" indicator, which yields a total of: 59 (PlumX).

With a more dissemination-oriented intent and targeting more general audiences, we can observe other more global scores such as:

  • The Total Score from Altmetric: 7.

It is essential to present evidence supporting full alignment with institutional principles and guidelines on Open Science and the Conservation and Dissemination of Intellectual Heritage. A clear example of this is:

  • The work has been submitted to a journal whose editorial policy allows open Open Access publication.
Leadership analysis of institutional authors

the author responsible for correspondence tasks has been GUIJARRO ROMERO, SANTIAGO.