Yli-Piipari quoted in Washington Post on validity of conducting studies with mobile phones
Conducting research using a mobile phone or other devices can affect the accuracy and validity of research studies, said Sami Yli-Piipari, an assistant professor of kinesiology, in a recent article in the Washington Post. Not only are the devices unreliable, but researchers can do very little to prevent participants from entering fake data.
An ongoing study at Stanford is part of the first generation of projects powered by ResearchKit, a set of free tools introduced by Apple in early 2015. Since then, more than 100,000 people have signed up, generating so much information that most researchers have only analyzed a tiny fraction of the results.
Unfortunately, the ResearchKit approach raises issues about participants’ privacy and data security, said Yli-Piipari, who is not part of the Stanford team. Furthermore, translating the knowledge gained from the study into usable advice for people reluctant to exercise poses another challenge.