Public lecture: “Against Behaviour Change”, by Gary Wolf | June 14

On the 14th of June Gary Wolf gave a public lecture titled: “Against Behaviour Change”. In his lecture, Gary Wolf has taken up the challenge of behaviourism and, explained what it means to be ‘against’ the concept of behaviour change. Furthermore he proposed a collective experiment of renunciation: what would happen if we denied ourselves the use of the word ‘behaviour?’ What words and concepts would emerge in the space left open?

Plain versions of behaviourism have been disavowed by contemporary psychology and social science. However, the vocabulary and intuitions associated with behaviourism continue to influence everyday practice associated with sensing and mobile health technologies; including clinical and research practice.

Quote Gary Wolf: “You can never say that an intervention has yielded into a result: there are too many factors that influence human behaviour”. Review on the public lecture available in Dutch, by Boudewijn Otten (HanzeMag).

MeetUp #14 Quantified Self | June 15
The MeetUp #14 Quantified Self was held at Hanze University Groningen, UAS, and consisted of two parts: 1) Show and Tell and 2) Poster presentations by students of the International minor: Quantified Self and Global Health.

Show and Tell
During the Show and Tell there were five personal, inspiring stories told about #QuantifiedSelf:
1. Ronald Fokkink: has intensively tracked his live as a diabetic for several years now and he will share his experiences. He is the perfect example of how patient-engaged care can improve health (care).
2. Ellis Bartholomeus (Ellis in Wonderland): drew a face to self-report her mood for the day for a period of six months. This inspired, and engaged her more than she anticipated. She shared her story about how the faces triggered her curiosity and provided many insights that motivated her.
3. Gerard Poels (Hetregentbijnanooit): cycles to work every day. For more than 8 years he has been tracking the Dutch weather during his cycle trips. How much rain did you expect to fall in the Netherlands?
4. Thomas Blomseth Christiansen (TOTTI labs) has tracked his every sneeze since May 2011. By now he has data on the onsets of six pollen seasons while he has been conducting experiments with his allergies to convince his immune system that grass pollen do not pose a real threat. Sneezing is believed to be inconspicuous and a nuisance. Thomas’ sneeze tracking has turned into a project to show you otherwise and almost took a life of its own.
5. Sara Rigarre: talked about making your life manageable with a disease like Parkinson. She is spending 8765 hours a year tracking her own health and learning from this.

Poster Presentations
During the Poster Presentations there was an opportunity for students to present their posters on their #QuantifiedSelf experience(s) – personal projects. Students from the international minor Quantified Seld and Global Health of the Hanze UAS explored the aspects of globalisation and health that are linked to digital health and self-tracking. They designed and performed a self-experiment according to the principles of single-subject design. They presented their results as infographics, evaluating the results obtained by their personal projects.
Downloads of the posters will be provided as soon as possible. Follow our announcements via Social Media: Twitter, Facebook andLinkedIn.

Inauguration visiting professor G.I. Wolf MA – New Business & IT, Hanze University Groningen, UAS
Gary Wolf, founder of QS Labs which supports the Quantified Self movement worldwide, was installed as visiting professor at Hanze UAS at the 15th of June. His inauguration will facilitate further collaboration. Together with Dr. Martijn de Groot (principal investigator Hanze UAS and co-founder QSI) he will work on enhancing the research and education programme and addressing questions that matter to the QS community. Another goal is collaboration with leaders in the QS community on distinctive projects.

One of these projects will be the exploration of the possibilities of launching a Quantified Self Journal, the first scientific journal focused on methods and research results from single-subject, self-initiated research projects.

Besides an inspiring #inauguration speech by Gary Wolf there were two official speakers from Hanze UAS during the ceremony:
1. Dr. P. van der Wijk, member of the Executive Board Hanze UAS.
2. Dr. H. Velthuijsen, professor of New Business and IT and leading professor of the Centre of Applied Research on Entrepreneurship.
We also welcomed the family of Gary Wolf and Henk Pijlman, chairman and president of the Executive Board Hanze UAS, to the ceremony.

Besides the public events there were also sessions with students of the Summerschool and International minor Global Health and Quantified Self. As well as sessions with researchers and other stakeholders concerning extension of the collaboration.

Movie Inauguration Gary Wolf
A film of the inauguration will be launched within a few weeks on the YouTube channel of the Quantified Self Institute. We will notify you via our Social Media channels.
Watch also the TED-talk of Gary Wolf. This talk (from 2010) on the Quantified Self has been watched nearly 800,000 times.