Testing the Efficacy of Pokemon Go for Increasing Physical Activity

Sedentary Lifestyle Clinical Trial

Official title:

Pokémon Go Modestly Increases Time Spent Active Among Healthy Adults

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT03109509
• Other study ID #: 201607768
• Secondary ID: 5K25HL122305
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• First received: April 5, 2017
• Last updated: April 26, 2017
• Start date: July 20, 2016
• Est. completion date: April 1, 2017

Study information

• Verified date: April 2017
• Source: University of Iowa
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

Historically, increasing activity was synonymous with exercise; however, it is now thought that even much more modest activity levels (e.g., simply walking) or merely decreasing the proportion of sedentary time may be sufficient to decrease future morbidity and mortality. Some interventions designed to increase activity have shown promise; others have been less successful. But even promising interventions are often difficult to generalize to real-life clinical settings. One barrier to monitoring the effectiveness of interventions has been the lack of availability of accurate, reliable and inexpensive personal activity monitoring equipment. The availability of inexpensive pedometers, and, more recently, low cost triaxial accelerometers, has now made it much easier to monitor activity levels and provide feedback to users. These devices are ideal for capturing activity associated with walking, the most popular and acceptable form of exercise, but only if patients actually wear them. Thus, there is a need to develop pragmatic approaches that encourage patients to not only wear these monitoring devices, but also motivate them to increase their activity.

In recent years, games have been used in a variety of settings to motivate and change behavior. Games not only provide performance feedback to patients, but also provide incentives for achieving goals in a context that is fun, intrinsically rewarding, and easy to understand. Successful games effectively exploit motivating social factors (e.g., competition, peer support, and entertainment) to maintain interest and engage participants. Steps are counted using a commercially available triaxial accelerometer (e.g., a FitBit). Pokemon Go is an augmented reality game that encourages players to go outside to search for Pokemon creatures.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 100
• Est. completion date: April 1, 2017
• Est. primary completion date: October 30, 2016
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: All
• Age group: 18 Years to 80 Years

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• 18-80 years of age, healthy adults, own smart phone, have access to the Internet, fluent in English, no contraindications to physical activity, not pregnant or planning to become pregnant, had not previously played Pokemon Go game

Exclusion Criteria:

• <18 year or older than 80 years of age, did not own smart phone, did not have access to the Internet, not fluent in English, any contraindications to physical activity, pregnant or planning to become pregnant in next 2 months, had previously played Pokemon Go game

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Sedentary Lifestyle

Intervention

Behavioral:
• Fitbit + Pokemon Go
Participants received a Fitbit Zip to wear daily for 8 weeks. Participants also received access to the Pokemon Go game.
• Fitbit Only
Participants received a Fitbit Zip to wear daily for 8 weeks.

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
n/a

Sponsors (2)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
University of Iowa	National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Average daily steps	Daily steps measured by Fitbit Zip	Eight weeks