Meaningful Feedback at Opportune Moments: How persuasive feedback motivates teenagers to move

Abstract

Teenagers spend a large proportion of their day doing sedentary activities. They sit in school during classes and breaks, and after school they sit while doing homework, watching television or playing computer games. Novel ways of stimulating teenagers to be more active include applying games and play, because of its intrinsically motivating value. This paper presents a qualitative study of the role of persuasive feedback in a physical activity game. We performed interviews with teenagers who used a running game for several weeks. We describe their attitude towards persuasive feedback, its perceived effectiveness and possibilities for improvement.