A day in the life: The quantified self

Much has been written recently about personalised learning. Many educators agree that one size does not fit all and that student centred learning is what we should all aspire to. It will be of great interest then, for anyone who subscribes to the notion of personal learning, that the latest Higher Education version of the Horizon Report lists 'The quantified self' as a trend we can expect to see adopted in the next 4-5 years.

What is the 'quantified self'? The Horizon report describes it as 'the phenomenon of consumers being able to closely track their daily activities through the use of technology. The emergence of wearable devices ... such as watches, wristbands and necklaces that are designed to automatically collect data that are helping people to manage their fitness, sleep cycles, and eating habits.' 

Essentially, the quantified self is all about personal metrics in the form of bio-data and other information we generate each day. These data are gathered via wearable devices (or other technologies nearby) and provide the individual with a 'big picture' of their daily routines, health state and other information they will find personally useful. The Horizon team predict that a widespread adoption of these technologies - in the context of higher education - is no more than 4-5 years away. It is not hard to see that other wearable devices, such as spectacles and headbands might also appear in the mix, as we move toward a time where personalised data are as valuable to us as our bank accounts.

The report goes on to develop this theme, providing a brief list of universities that have recently implemented small scale versions of personalised data gathering. The use of life-logging technologies is one emerging aspect of the quantified self. Another is the beta-testing of Google Glass. In medicine, accelerometers are already in use to monitor the health conditions of at risk patients. Such tools are capable of recording any and every second of our day, presenting it later as a comprehensible summary of our lives. Questions are raised though, around issues of privacy and safety. What if the data fell into the wrong hands, or more likely - what if people indiscriminately share their intimate, personal data on social media sites, as they already do with images and other personal information? Will this not make them vulnerable to as yet undetermined threats? What if such big data were to be used unscrupulously as a part of surveillance campaign? Will we need additional legislation to protect us? Clearly there are several concerns that have yet to be addressed around this emerging concept.

The Horizon team are speculative about exactly how 'the quantified self' might materialise in authentic academic contexts. They simply don't know, and admit as much: 'Educators at the moment can only hypothesize about a new era of the academic quantified self, but interest is strong and growing.'  It may only be a short time though, before we discover new ways to measure learning through 'big data' acquisition tools, and then apply them to improve pedagogy. There are already indications about how data logging our environment could promote better learning. Is it now time to quantify ourselves? What are your views?

Cyborg eye image by Vern Hart
Google Glass image by Loic Le Meur


A day in the life: The quantified self by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.