Insights into research at HEC Lausanne-UNIL – Mobile apps that aim to improve our sporting performance, diet or well-being are becoming increasingly popular. But do they really achieve what they set out to do over the long term, and if so, why? Those are the questions Prof. Mauro Cherubini, HEC Lausanne (UNIL) and his colleagues and co-authors have answered in their latest research.
Mobile motivational apps often include incentive mechanisms, such as messages of encouragement or monetary rewards, to help foster long-lasting behavior change.
But it has to be said that while the users of these apps may be sufficiently motivated to adopt a particular behavior for a limited period, they find it hard to keep it up over a longer time.
In fact, in the most extreme cases, and as revealed in the research carried out by Prof. Cherubini and his co-authors, introducing a system of rewards and messages of encouragement could lead some users to reduce their physical activity rather than improving their performance over the long term.
So how could these apps be changed to help users achieve their long-term goals? By studying in detail the question of the intrinsic motivation index (IMI) of each user, have Prof. Mauro Cherubini and his team - Gabriela Villalobos-Zuñiga (HEC Lausanne-UNIL, Department of infomration systems), Marc-Olivier Boldi (HEC Lausanne-UNIL, Department of operations), and Riccardo Bonazzi (HES-SO Valais) - found the key to resolving this challenge?
Find out in our HEC Impact blog article.
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