Rationale behind socially influencing design choices for health behavior change

Persuasive technologies for health behavior change often include social influence features. Social influence in the design of persuasive technology has been described as a black box. This case study sheds light on design practices by identifying factors that affect the design of social influence features in health behavior change applications and the designers’ understanding of the social influence aspects. Our findings are twofold: First, the two most positively inclined social influence features, namely cooperation and normative influence, were missing from the reviewed applications. Second, the medical condition — the persuasive technology targets — has a major influence on consideration and integration of social influence features in health behavior change applications. Our findings should be taken into account when frameworks and guidelines are created for the design of social influence features in health behavior change applications.