Introduction
In recent times, the niche of wearable devices has grown tremendously, and it will continue to grow until there is a demand for such technologies. One such wearable device is a smartwatch – a portable gadget intended to be worn on a wrist and aimed to record heart rate and other vital signs. The Pebble watch designers created the first independent smartwatch in 2012 (Rawassizadeh et al., 2015, p. 45). Although it was not the first gadget in the niche of smartwatches because Sony introduced its first device earlier, the Pebble gadget could function independently without being connected to a smartphone. Since then, different companies began to develop their niches of wearables, intending their gadgets either for daily use or for specific purposes. Despite their limited function and other shortages, the smartwatch industry will continue to grow and develop in the next several years.
The Purposes and Uses of Smartwatches
Nowadays, smartwatches have different functions, but they offer many standard features. Thus, these wearable devices show smartphone notifications, informing their users about messages or incoming calls. They can also display notifications about a user’s current health condition or movement detection. For example, the newest Apple Watch can track a person’s condition after one falls: if a person does not move, the watch assumes they have injuries and alerts authorities on a person’s behalf (Silbert, 2021, para. 7). In addition, different smartwatches support diverse apps, like apps for hiking, diving, sports, and other applications needed to accomplish specific purposes. People also use these devices to manage media playback for them. For example, when users listen to music or watch a video on their smartphone, they can change the volume or tracks on their smartwatch. Moreover, most wearables include a GPS (Global Positioning System) to track a person’s location and receive location-specific alerts (Silbert, 2021, para. 12). These and other smartwatch functions make it a practical and useful device for many people.
The Problems of Smartwatches and How to Solve Them
Although smartwatches aim to make people’s lives easier and more comfortable, they can also cause headaches for several reasons. The main problem with all smartwatches is a quick battery drain. Modern smartwatches get through a day of normal use, and some devices get up to two-three days (Silbert, 2021, para. 13). Moreover, since the gadgets are linked to smartphones, they can also drain their battery. To solve this problem, the producers of wearable devices recommend disabling some apps, dimming the brightness on the smartwatch, and switching off Bluetooth. However, all these pieces of advice are useless because they will limit the functions of a smartwatch, making it a simple watch without any additional elements.
Another problem that may occur is disjointed and inaccurate voice control. For example, Wear OS users report that their smartwatches are not “triggering the Google Assistant when they should be” (Hill & Jansen, 2022, para. 4). It happens because the device cannot understand some words or hears them wrong. To fix this bug, one should try to use different voice tones and volumes, and if it does not help, one should operate the gadget manually. Some other problems associated with wearable devices are lost connection with a phone, lost data, and trouble with notifications. All these issues can be fixed manually, but they cause inconveniences and take much time to manage the settings. However, if smartwatch companies can make interfaces simpler and fix bugs and battery issues, this business will continue to flourish in the future.
How Will Smartwatches Change, Support, or Extend Current Ways of Doing Things?
Smartwatches make human lives more comfortable and allow for tracking health more effectively. Thus, these small devices encourage people to be more physically active, reminding them when they have been sedentary and providing them with short workouts. Smartwatches will also support those who require frequent medications, allowing patients to adhere to their medication schedule and not forget to take pills. Moreover, parents can track their children’s location and monitor their activities without being invasive. Parents can set up a safe district for their children, and when a child leaves this zone, they will receive a notification. One can see that smartwatches help parents always stay in touch with their children and monitor their position and activities.
Research shows that wearable devices can help prevent stroke and other heart diseases. According to Guo et al. (2019), “a smartwatch strap with single ECG [electrocardiogram] sensor may be a more comfortable method, with 93% sensitivity and 84% specificity of AF [atrial fibrillation] diagnosis” (p. 2366). Another study showed that the participants who used Fitbits or other similar apps walked a higher number of steps, which led to increased weight loss (Massoomi & Handberg, 2019, p. 183). Thus, wearables will change healthcare if they can contact emergency services immediately when some serious changes in a user’s health occur. In such a way, healthcare providers may use the information from smartwatches to track patients’ health and prevent diseases.
Which Group of People Will Benefit Most?
Although all people can use smartwatches, some groups will benefit more. First, smartwatches are a perfect tracking system for parents and children. They are more reliable and convenient than smartphones because they are always on the wrist. If a child or an older person with dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, or other mental problems leaves a safety zone, their relatives or health providers will immediately know about their geolocation.
Moreover, health practitioners will benefit from smartwatches in other ways. For instance, they can use wearables to monitor patients’ health, including heart rhythm, blood pressure, and even oxygen levels. If a patient complains of health problems, a healthcare provider will look through the data they receive from the smartwatch to an app and see whether a patient has deprivation of sleep, heart rate changes, or other issues. Athletes can also benefit from using wearable devices because they can help them measure their exercises and physical load more precisely. Thus, parents, healthcare professionals, and athletes will benefit most from this new technology.
Conclusion
I think that smartwatches are useful and helpful devices that make our lives more comfortable. A smartwatch allows people to answer phone calls without taking a phone in their hands. Moreover, one can pay for their purchases in supermarkets, restaurants, and other public places, which offer contactless payments. I like the possibility of paying with a watch without needing to take up money from a purse. I also enjoy a physical activity tracking function because it encourages me to stay fit and do more exercise. A GPS-tracking system is another important function that should not be ignored. As already mentioned, this function is most valuable for parents and those who have older relatives since it can help them find their close ones when needed.
I believe that smartwatches will continue to succeed, especially if their producers fix all existing bugs and problems. I do not even need to imagine the scenario where I am using this technology because I already use it. I can only imagine sending my health-related data from the smartwatch to my healthcare provider. I do not have such a function in my smartwatch, but if I had, I believe that it would help me improve my health and prevent heart failure in the future.
The main assumption for a smartwatch is that people will wear it while sleeping, exercising, and swimming and feel comfortable with a small touch screen. I agree with this assumption because I think that if one of the main functions of smartwatches is to monitor one’s heart rate and sleep length, people will need to wear them constantly to receive proper reports. As to the small touch screen, I feel comfortable with it, and I think that most people will share this view. Wearable devices should not be big; instead, they should be imperceptible and not distract users from other daily activities. Those who feel uncomfortable with a small size of a smartwatch should think of different devices to monitor their activities and health.
The smartwatch industry is constantly growing and changing, and it will continue to succeed in the future until there is a demand for these wearable devices. Even though these gadgets are not vitally important, they can make human lives more comfortable. Moreover, if all smartwatches have a function of health monitoring and the possibility to send this information to healthcare providers, more and more people will want to wear them. In conclusion, wearables are a part of human life, and they will not die off in the nearest future. Thus, people should get the best out of them and use them for their purposes, improving life quality and health and staying in touch with their loved ones.
References
Guo, Y., Wang, H., Zhang, H., Liu, T., Liang, Z., Xia, Y., Yan, L., Xing, Y., Shi, H., Li, S., Liu, Y., Liu, F., Feng, M., Chen, Y., & Lip, G.Y. H. (2019). Mobile photoplethysmographic technology to detect atrial fibrillation.Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 74(19), 2365-2375. Web.
Hill, S., & Jansen, M. (2022). The most common Google Wear OS problems and how to fix them.Digital Trends. Web.
Massoomi, M. R., & Handberg, E. M. (2019). Increasing and evolving role of smart devices in modern medicine. European Cardiology Review, 14(3), 181-186. Web.
Rawassizadeh, R., Price, B. A., & Petre, M. (2015). Wearables: Has the age of smartwatches finally arrived?Communications of the ACM, 58(1), 45-47. Web.
Silbert, S. (2021). What is a smartwatch and what do they do?Lifewire. Web.