Perceptions and expectations of an artificially intelligent physical activity digital assistant — A focus group study

Corneel Vandelanotte*, Danya Hodgetts, D. L.I.H.K. Peris, Ashmita Karki, Carol Maher, Tasadduq Imam, Mamunur Rashid, Quyen To, Stewart Trost

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

    Abstract

    Artificially intelligent physical activity digital assistants that use the full spectrum of machine learning capabilities have not yet been developed and examined. This study aimed to explore potential users' perceptions and expectations of using such a digital assistant. Six 90-min online focus group meetings (n = 45 adults) were conducted. Meetings were recorded, transcribed and thematically analysed. Participants embraced the idea of a ‘digital assistant’ providing physical activity support. Participants indicated they would like to receive notifications from the digital assistant, but did not agree on the number, timing, tone and content of notifications. Likewise, they indicated that the digital assistant's personality and appearance should be customisable. Participants understood the need to provide information to the digital assistant to allow for personalisation, but varied greatly in the extent of information that they were willing to provide. Privacy issues aside, participants embraced the idea of using artificial intelligence or machine learning in return for a more functional and personal digital assistant. In sum, participants were ready for an artificially intelligent physical activity digital assistant but emphasised a need to personalise or customise nearly every feature of the application. This poses challenges in terms of cost and complexity of developing the application.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)2362-2380
    Number of pages19
    JournalApplied Psychology: Health and Well-Being
    Volume16
    Issue number4
    Early online date13 Sept 2024
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - Nov 2024

    Scopus Subject Areas

    • Applied Psychology

    User-Defined Keywords

    • artificial intelligence
    • chatbot
    • conversational agent
    • health behaviour change intervention
    • large language model
    • machine learning

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