Lecturer, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (Health Economics・Labor Economics)

OKANIWA  Fusae

▲The experiment uses an app that calculates nutrients and calories and provides advice simply based on just a picture of a meal.

Wearable devices and smartphone apps are increasingly being used to record people’s health information and help them improve their health. In many fields, AI is expected to replace some of the high-level tasks previously performed by humans, and efforts are being made every day to proactively implement superior new technologies in medicine and healthcare.

The problem we are facing is that even if a superior new technology is developed and we theoretically know that we will be healthy if we take advantage of it, we have trouble immediately changing our behavior and making a desired behavior a habit. In order for developed technologies to be used effectively, knowledge about human behavioral modification has to be applied, e.g., when do people change their behavior and what impetuses promote independent behavior. Our research is examining the effectiveness of AI-based health intervention systems from the perspective of the humanities and social sciences, based on the assumption that such systems will be widespread in society in the future. Through experiments involving various interventions, we aim to objectively verify the effectiveness of developed technologies and to identify the conditions to enhance their effectiveness.