To find out if you’re in good shape, it’s best to examine the strength and structure of your circle of friends.
To find out if they are in good physical condition, many people rely on connected bracelets, in particular those marketed by the FitBit brand.
Designed as real objects of measurement, these “electronic coaches to improve our daily and sporting activity” measure our heart rate at any time of the day, whether we are running or giving a presentation at the gym. job. They also measure the number of steps we take during the day, monitor our sleep, our diet and our weight.
But as smart as they are, these connected bracelets cannot give better indications of your health and well-being than… your group of friends. This is what a new study published in the journal PLOS One.
Carried out by researchers at the University of Notre Dame, located in Indiana in the United States, it was particularly interested in the structure of groups of friends and the place one occupies there as an individual. : This position can say a lot about health and wellness, says Nitesh V. Chawla, professor of computer science and engineering and lead author of the study.
Predictions twice as accurate
To reach this conclusion, the researchers followed participants wearing a Fitbit bracelet that recorded their physiological data (sleep, heart rate, activity level, etc.). They also completed surveys and self-reports about their feelings of stress, happiness and positivity. The team then analyzed and modeled the collected data. They also noted the characteristics of individuals’ group of friends: how many members are in it, what connections exist between friends. The results showed a strong correlation between group structure, heart rate, number of steps and activity level.
Concretely, this means that the study of the circle of friends has significantly improved predictions of a person’s health and well-being. And that data turned out to be much more relevant than that collected by FitBit alone. For example, when the data from the group of friends are combined with those from the connected bracelet, the learning model developed by the researchers improved the prediction of happiness by 65% and the self-assessed prediction by 54%. health, 55% prediction of positive attitude and 38% prediction of success.
Friendship, a guarantee of health and well-being
“This study asserts that without information on sociability and group of friends, we only have an incomplete view of an individual’s state of well-being. To be fully predictive or to be able to developing interventions, it is essential to also be aware of the structural characteristics of the social network, ”says Professor Chawla.
For the researcher, these findings can be invaluable, especially for employers seeking to improve the health and well-being of their employees. “When we hear that health and wellness programs focused on smart bracelets in the workplace aren’t working, we should ask ourselves if it’s because we take a one-dimensional view where we just give to employees the bracelets and forget them without taking the trouble to understand the role that social relations in health? “, he asks.
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