Andersen, Kristian Coff Schang

Jensen, Anders Mandrup

Thorsen, Kasper Emil

This paper examines the problem that apps that intend to improve our health, are not effective in regards to making people exercise, whereas games and other entertainment apps made primarily for pastime easily catches the attention of most. To investigate the cause of this issue, we made use of material presented by Nir Eyal, Charles Duhigg, B. J. Fogg, Cass R. Sunstein and Richard H. Thaler. Based on the knowledge obtained through the theories of the aforementioned theorists, we have selected and analyzed a collection of apps from iTunes’ App Store’s Top 100 list of most downloaded apps. We have examined these apps to find out which elements contribute most to their popularity. We have used a variety of scientific methods in order to gather information and obtain knowledge relevant to our project. Furthermore we have examined which elements these apps possess that can create addiction as well as examined the different types of addiction that continuous use creates. Lastly we have created a design mockup of an app, which illustrates the significant elements we found most useful. As a product of the increasing tendency to nominate your friends to perform a variety of challenging activities using social medias, our mockup describes and illustrates an app that allows the users to nominate each other to perform these activities. Using this increasing tendency we have designed an app that intends to give the user a more active, and thereby healthier, lifestyle while having fun. Based on a combination of the aforesaid tendency and information obtained through our analysis, we have designed an app that makes exercising appealing. Our research shows that the nudging elements of entertainment apps are not as effective when used in health and fitness apps, as going for a run requires physical effort and therefore significantly higher motivation, than playing a game on your phone. We can conclude that using the nudging elements of entertainment apps to trigger the user to open the app, and let a nomination trigger the activity itself, will result in a much higher chance of the user doing something active because a challenge from a friend is a lot more motivating than a challenge from an app.This paper examines the problem that apps that intend to improve our health, are not effective in regards to making people exercise, whereas games and other entertainment apps made primarily for pastime easily catches the attention of most. To investigate the cause of this issue, we made use of material presented by Nir Eyal, Charles Duhigg, B. J. Fogg, Cass R. Sunstein and Richard H. Thaler. Based on the knowledge obtained through the theories of the aforementioned theorists, we have selected and analyzed a collection of apps from iTunes’ App Store’s Top 100 list of most downloaded apps. We have examined these apps to find out which elements contribute most to their popularity. We have used a variety of scientific methods in order to gather information and obtain knowledge relevant to our project. Furthermore we have examined which elements these apps possess that can create addiction as well as examined the different types of addiction that continuous use creates. Lastly we have created a design mockup of an app, which illustrates the significant elements we found most useful. As a product of the increasing tendency to nominate your friends to perform a variety of challenging activities using social medias, our mockup describes and illustrates an app that allows the users to nominate each other to perform these activities. Using this increasing tendency we have designed an app that intends to give the user a more active, and thereby healthier, lifestyle while having fun. Based on a combination of the aforesaid tendency and information obtained through our analysis, we have designed an app that makes exercising appealing. Our research shows that the nudging elements of entertainment apps are not as effective when used in health and fitness apps, as going for a run requires physical effort and therefore significantly higher motivation, than playing a game on your phone. We can conclude that using the nudging elements of entertainment apps to trigger the user to open the app, and let a nomination trigger the activity itself, will result in a much higher chance of the user doing something active because a challenge from a friend is a lot more motivating than a challenge from an app

Apps ændrer din hverdag: Apps to change your life

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Roskilde Universitet