# Investigating Opportunities to Support Kids' Agency and Well-being: A Review of Kids' Wearables

**Authors:** Rachael Zehrung, Lily Huang, Bongshin Lee, Eun Kyoung Choe  
**arXiv:** [2104.05979](https://arxiv.org/abs/2104.05979)  
**Date:** 2021-04-13  
**Summary page:** https://www.summarizepaper.com/en/arxiv-id/2104.05979v1/

## Key points

- The study focused on exploring wearable devices marketed for children and their potential to promote children's health and well-being.
- 47 kids' wearables were surveyed, collecting data on functionality, product names, costs, target user groups, and method of data access.
- Affinity analysis was used to group similar features into representative categories.
- Deductive analysis contextualized the purpose of functionality recorded for each device.
- Many kids' wearables focus on enabling parents to communicate with their children, ensure their safety, encourage physical activity, and nurture good habits.
- Wearables can serve as more than just monitoring devices but also support children's needs and interests.
- Findings suggest designing wearables that treat children and parents as equal stakeholders rather than solely focusing on parental surveillance.
- Implications for kids' agency, long-term development, and overall well-being are highlighted.
- Future research efforts related to designing wearables for kids' self-tracking and collaborative tracking with parents are identified.
- Family-oriented information systems have the potential to support communication, connectedness, and health and parenting goals within families.

## Summary

The study focused on exploring the current landscape of wearable devices marketed for children and their potential to promote children's health and well-being. The researchers surveyed 47 kids' wearables and collected data on their functionality, product names, costs, target user groups, and method of data access. They analyzed the collected data using affinity analysis and deductive analysis. During the affinity analysis, the researchers grouped similar features into representative categories. They refined initial categories into higher-level sub-themes based on the recorded features. In the deductive analysis, the researchers contextualized the purpose of the functionality recorded for each device. They aimed to understand parents' needs and information usage in managing their children. To do this, they adopted some themes and sub-themes from a previous categorization of parents' information needs by Kuzminykh and Lank but also created new categories to fully capture all the features present in the devices. The study found that many kids' wearables are technologically advanced devices that focus on enabling parents to communicate with their children, ensure their safety, encourage physical activity, and nurture good habits. The findings suggest that wearables can serve as more than just monitoring devices but can also support children's needs and interests. The researchers discuss how these findings could inform the design of wearables that treat children and parents as equal stakeholders rather than solely focusing on parental surveillance. They highlight implications for kids' agency, long-term development, and overall well-being. Furthermore, they identify future research efforts related to designing wearables for kids' self-tracking and collaborative tracking with parents. This field explores using technology to promote healthy behaviors in a family context. Family-oriented information systems have the potential to support communication, connectedness, and health and parenting goals within families. Overall, this study provides valuable insights into the current landscape of kids' wearables and highlights opportunities for designing wearables that go beyond monitoring to support children's well-being.