Abstract
Considering the growing adoption of smartwatches in Ghanaian fitness communities, this study examines the socio-cultural factors contributing to the rise in digital self-tracking practices. This study is based on four ethnographic revisits to Ghana, where we draw on 20 semi-structured interviews and participant observations with fitness enthusiasts. We apply algorithmic subjectivity as the theoretical lens to analyse the rise and adoption of smartwatches in the construction of fitness and social identities. Using reflexive thematic analysis, we identified four primary features of the adoption of smartwatches in Ghana: minimising the fear of developing non-communicable diseases, counteracting a sitting culture, habit hacking and symbolic power. The study argues that as users strive to achieve their fitness goals, smartwatches in Ghana can be understood as a new form of socio-technical infrastructure that promotes fitness and health-oriented behaviours. We, however, caution that smartwatch use contributes to new ‘algorithmic subjectivities’ which emphasise the body and its health as tied to quantitative outputs.
Introduction
Within the context of Martschukat’s (2021) ‘Age of Fitness’, Millington’s (2018) ‘Fitness 2.0’, or Cederström and Spicer’s (2015) ‘Wellness Syndrome’, self-tracking has become an integral aspect of contemporary fitness and health practices. In major cities across Sub-Saharan Africa, a significant portion of the population is embracing a more active lifestyle (Archambault, 2021). This shift towards increased physical activity is reflected in the growing number of individuals participating in various fitness and wellness activities, such as outdoor group exercises, community walks and workouts in fitness centres. At the same time, digital self-tracking has become an essential element of the broader trend towards what Andreasson and Johansson (2014) consider as the global ‘fitness revolution’. Smartwatches allow users to monitor various physiological variables, including steps, heart rate, workout intensity and sleep patterns (Ajana, 2018; Lupton, 2016; Neff and Nafus, 2016). Hundreds of self-tracking apps like Strava, MyFitnessPal, Apple Health and Google Fit are paired with smartwatches to enable users to upload, aggregate, display and analyse their fitness practices.
The rise in self-tracking practices has been met by a parallel rise in scholarship addressing the topic. With the notable exception of Borenstein’s (2021) and Crawley’s (2024, 2021) ethnographic work on professional Ethiopian runners, nearly all scholarship on self-tracking focuses on Western examples and practices. While Hannah Borenstein and Michael Crawley explore self-tracking as a livelihood approach, we lean towards the practice as a leisure and fitness pursuit by examining the rise and adoption of self-tracking within the Ghanaian fitness landscape. It is within these contentions that the study explores the question: Why are smartwatches adopted by Ghanaian individuals who participate in fitness practices? Here, we are interested in the growing influence of smartwatches in local fitness communities in Ghana. Part of our curiosity to examine this question also stems from how scholarly works have often depicted Africa as an exceptional entity (Elul, 2022), disregarding its citizens’ roles as active participants in the digital fitness revolution (Crawley, 2024). This tendency, as noted by Ferguson (2013), has resulted in the pervasive view of Africa as a peripheral player in the global analysis of technology and digitalisation transformation. This present study aligns with a small body of literature (Antwi et al., 2025; Borenstein, 2021; Crawley, 2024, 2021) that seeks to provide new perspectives on the rise and implications of self-tracking technologies in Africa.
Background: The changing fitness culture in Ghana
Common in many other African countries, sedentary behaviours and physical inactivity have become a public health concern among the rising middle-class (Balis et al., 2021; Mensah et al., 2022). In traditional Ghanaian societies, a physically active lifestyle has long been an integral part of daily life activities. The heavy manual labour of domestic tasks (such as cooking, washing, and sweeping) and active traditional outdoor games (for example, pilolo, ampe, and chaskele) 1 were examples of the embeddedness of physical activity in daily life routines. Such household chores and games, which often demanded significant physical effort, exemplified the inherent connection between daily life and corporeal exertion (Balis et al., 2019). These routines and activities have gradually eroded and morphed into a modern sedentary lifestyle, particularly in urban areas (Mensah et al., 2022).
Existing data indicate that Ghana's physical activity guidelines have yet to reach the intended recipients and undergo essential cultural adaptation (Balis et al., 2021). The 2018 Ghana Report Card on Physical Activity for Young People shows that less than 40% of Ghanaian children and youth engage in any type of fitness activity (Nyawornota et al., 2018). Among the middle class, the 2020 National Health Policy reveals that only 25% exercised regularly (Ministry of Health, 2020). These studies also reveal a lack of familiarity with the Ministry of Health guidelines, including how to achieve recommended activity levels. Despite lifestyle-related diseases accounting for nearly half of all mortalities, there is a noticeable absence of national communications campaigns and mass participation events on physical activities (WHO, 2022). Such alarming statistics are familiar among several West African countries, even when there is a vast amount of research documenting the physical, mental and societal benefits of participating in fitness practices (Bangsbo et al., 2019).
Following the 2022 WHO report on Ghana's non-existent national campaigns on physical activities and a plea from the office of the vice president, the Ministry of Youth and Sport initiated a national fitness project. As the first National Fitness Day commenced on 10th September 2022 in Accra, every second Saturday of every month is promoted as a communal fitness day (National Sports Authority, 2022). Such nationally motivated initiatives could make Ghanaians more active by changing their mindset on prolonged sedentary lifestyles. The launch of National Fitness Day further prompted gym owners, fitness instructors, keep-fit clubs, community leaders, radio and TV personalities, church leaders and other non-governmental agencies to organise body-based exercises for their local communities. Yet, these efforts face three main challenges: first, there is no formal set of best practices to guide the initiatives; second, there is no existing physical infrastructure in the form of separate walking paths, safe pedestrian spaces and vehicular management; third, cultural values and attitudes toward exercise and fitness are also major barriers to getting people active (Charway and Strandbu, 2023).
While the practice of maintaining an active lifestyle is hindered by the lack of an enabling environment, our ethnographic work suggests digital self-tracking presents a possible solution. Although the adoption of self-tracking technologies in Ghanaian fitness spaces is largely a new phenomenon (Worlanyo et al., 2023), smartwatches have led to a significant shift in how the middle class engage in health and fitness practices (Antwi et al., 2025). Could smartwatches complement the government's approach to encouraging Ghanaians towards a more sustainable, healthier, and active lifestyle? Whether it is outdoor communal exercises on Saturdays or individuals at a fitness centre, the use of smartwatches is not uncommon. It is within this new fitness culture that self-tracking technologies have become a digital tool for improving physical health metrics.
Literature and theoretical framing
Socio-cultural analysis of self-tracking and algorithmic subjectivity
While bodily self-tracking is not a new practice (Crawford et al., 2015; Vertinsky, 2008), as part of the ‘second fitness boom’ (Millington, 2018), it exists in both reach and scale in ways not possible in a pre-digital, pre-Web 2.0 world. As demonstrated in Lupton (2017, 2016, 2015, 2014a, 2014b, 2013), critical analyses of self-tracking emphasise the neoliberal underpinnings of the practice. Lupton’s, 2016 book, ‘The Quantified Self’, remains a central text in this regard. Positioning twenty-first-century self-tracking within the larger context of neoliberalism, she argues that the normalisation of self-tracking technologies and practices has shifted responsibility for health, wellness, fitness and success onto the individual. This means that a failure to be ‘fit’ is positioned as a failure of the self, with any underlying political-economic or other social factors made invisible.
Within sociocultural studies of self-tracking, ethnographic research has been a common method to examine what it means when people turn their everyday experiences into data. These studies (for example, Bianca, 2021; Borenstein, 2021; Crawley, 2021; Crawley, 2024; Esmonde, 2020; Kressbach, 2024; Kristensen et al., 2021) have contextualised self-tracking within the broader discussions of sport, fitness, health and surveillance. Our study employs an ethnographic approach, drawing from the first author's fieldwork, which includes observations, casual conversation during fitness sessions, participation in group aerobic workouts, and joining weekly communal fitness walks. These activities were conducted in fitness spaces within the Accra and Kumasi metropolitan areas.
Theoretically, our work is aligned with the scholarly work on the socio-cultural aspects of self-tracking practices. Specifically, we understand the practice as positioned within a larger, historically-specific wellness imperative where users are encouraged to self-track for self-improvement. We also recognise self-tracking as an embodied practice that plays a role in subject formation (Borenstein, 2021; Crawley, 2021; Lupton, 2014b). Self-trackers engage with data-driven insights to inform their self-understanding and meaning-making processes. As users internalise the data provided by self-tracking devices, they actively construct and negotiate their identities in relation to their fitness, health, and personal goals. In her book ‘Addiction by Design’, Natasha Schüll explores how digitally networked devices’ algorithmic features draw users into the ‘machine zone’ (Schüll, 2012). She argues that individuals become entangled between personal agency and algorithmic influence, which can lead to a sense of dependency and loss of control. This knotted interaction includes behaviour adjustment, emotional attachment and an over-reliance on technology over one's intuition. In this respect, we engage with Schüll’s (2021) question of whether algorithmically driven devices control or empower individual agency.
The concept of algorithmic subjectivity (Lupton, 2016) as a theoretical lens emerged from the analysis of the ethnographic work as we came to see the ways in which self-tracking moved beyond the realm of health and fitness and into identity formation. Self-tracking devices represent a form of governance technology that enables individuals to better understand and manage their health, as well as recognise issues that necessitate intervention. The algorithms inherent in self-tracking devices play a crucial role in transforming physiological signals into easily interpretable data (Williamson, 2015). This is presented as numerical values and gamified visualisations (for example, the 10,000 steps target and sleep scores), which facilitate self-governance and informed decision-making for self-improvement.
Several ethnographic studies have explored how individuals increasingly rely on digital technologies and algorithmic data to understand and manage themselves (Armano et al., 2022; Schüll, 2018; N Schüll, 2021). Here, we follow Lupton’s (2016) notion of ‘algorithmic subjectivity’. Writing about sexual and reproductive self-tracking apps, she summarises: These technologies configure a certain type of approach to understanding and experiencing one's body, an algorithmic subjectivity in which the body and its health states, functions and activities are portrayed and understood predominantly via quantified calculations, predictions and comparisons. (Lupton, 2016: 99)
Methodology
Data collection
Following ethical approval by the Norwegian Centre for Research Data, informed consent was obtained from participants before interviews. Using ethnographic revisits (Burawoy, 2003) as a methodological approach, the first author (Henceforward, I/me) visited Ghana four times between November 2020 and April 2024. Ethnographic revisits occur when a researcher undertakes participant observation by studying others in their space and time, with the view of comparing the site with the same study at an earlier point in time (Burawoy, 2003). The uncertainty surrounding COVID-19 and lockdown speculations necessitated conducting shorter field visits at different phases. During this study period, my interactions at the research sites were primarily embodied, as I actively participated in various physical activities alongside fitness enthusiasts. This included joining organised group aerobic exercises, community-based health walks, and workout sessions at fitness centres in Kumasi and Accra. Actively participating in these routine exercise sessions allowed me to engage in informal conversations and ‘small talk’ within the fitness spaces. Such interactions provided insights into fitness enthusiasts’ thoughts, experiences and perspectives as they engaged with fitness-tracking technologies.
During the second field visit, I conducted interviews with 4 fitness instructors, 11 gym users and 5 communal fitness walk participants. While the interviews with the fitness instructors usually lasted 90 min, all other interviews were 45–60 min. Interviews had open-ended questions regarding participants’ motivation and experiences with their smartwatches. We adopted scenario questions from Attig and Franke (2019) and existing studies (for example, Lupton, 2016; Neff and Nafus, 2016; Rettberg, 2014) on how users integrate and interact with smartwatches. Also, our experiences as fitness enthusiasts and self-trackers partly informed some of the questions. All the interviews were conducted using a mix of English and Twi. The interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed into a total of 206 pages of single-spaced text.
Participants and the empirical site
The participants (see Table 1) were categorised into three user groups: fitness instructors, gym members, and communal health walk participants. Finding fitness instructors for the interviews was done through purposive sampling, whilst all other gym users were snowballed through the fitness instructors and other smartwatch users. The instructors had a fair idea about who uses the gym spaces regularly. Unlike the 11 gym users, all 5 communal walk participants were conveniently recruited from community-initiated health campaigns.
Participants in the semi-structured interviews and observations.
Follow-up discussions conducted via WhatsApp.
All interviews conducted via Zoom/WhatsApp.
Participants had to fulfil two criteria. First, they needed to own a smartwatch and consider themselves fitness enthusiasts, ensuring they had ongoing firsthand experience using their smartwatch in fitness settings. Second, participants had to exercise in an indoor fitness centre or be part of an outdoor keep-fit group, exposing them to the social norms, group dynamics and interactions common in these fitness environments. Participants were recruited during the first trip and interviewed during the second field trip. The first two trips to Ghana occurred during the COVID-19 lockdown and required a reasonable level of restrictions. As much as the movement of people was restricted, this was also the period with heightened concern about health issues (Charway et al., 2022). While the pandemic may have raised health consciousness and driven the need to track one's physical health metrics, participants did not abandon using smartwatches once the pandemic was over.
The 20 participants (see Table 2) were from Accra (n = 10) and Kumasi (n = 10). Most of them were middle-aged and used smartwatches that were considered high-end by their own standards. The watches used include Apple (n = 8), Samsung (n = 4), Fitbit (n = 7) and Huawei (n = 1). All participants had attained higher education. Except for one, all the participants were employed in sectors that required an 8 am to 5 pm job duty. Having such a work schedule meant that the participants usually joined workout sessions before sunrise and after sunset. The selected empirical sites comprised four fitness centres (two in each city), popular streets and parking lots known for hosting group aerobic sessions. These locations were chosen due to their significance as gathering places for fitness practices and social interactions among fitness enthusiasts.
Participants demographics.
Ethical considerations and reflexivity
Before every interview, I provided participants with a brief overview of the study's purpose and obtained their informed consent through both written and oral means. Participants were assured that their identities would be anonymised. Given that I grew up in Ghana, I am familiar with certain cultural customs. As a Ghanaian researcher with an understanding and appreciation of local norms and customs, I benefited from the privilege of being a ‘cultural insider’ (Suwankhong and Liamputtong, 2015). Following the initial encounters with the fitness centres and being a participant observer in workout sessions in gyms and community health walks, it became tricky to navigate ethical dilemmas in monitoring the tension between involvement and detachment from familiar contexts (Berger, 2015). Familiarity also meant that participants could assume I was familiar with their realities and withhold interesting information (Iphofen and Tolich, 2018; Patton, 2015). Being part of the social setting in fitness spaces, while at the same time being accorded some type of social status (as a PhD candidate living abroad), meant there was a level of asymmetry of power dynamics in my everyday interactions with other fitness enthusiasts. However, being a self-tracker in the same age group as most of the participants brought a good flow to the introductory conversations, as we could discuss a host of topics and share similar experiences.
A striking challenge encountered throughout the data collection period, particularly being a participant-observer, is that events regarding fitness practices can be dramatically corporeal (McNarry et al., 2020). As fitness enthusiasts who track our daily physical activities, there was also a need to self-reflect and identify our assumptions concerning personal experiences with tracking and training.
Analytical approach
To capture the adoption of smartwatches in Ghanaian fitness spaces, the interview and observation data were analysed by thematising participants’ responses. Our approach to the data analysis was shaped by Braun and Clarke’s (2022) practical guidebook and their flexible stages of reflexive thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2019). We began the data analysis by reading and re-reading through all the transcripts, building familiarity with the data sets. Field notes from observations were read in parallel to the transcriptions to contextualise the interviews. Using NVivo 14, initial codes were manually generated, and similar codes were clustered to generate patterns that captured shared meanings. For example, the code ‘work out reminder’ and ‘task completion’ were integrated into a sub-theme labelled ‘smartwatch as a tool for habit hacking’. While some of the codes focused on meanings from semantic levels and had obvious explicit meanings, others were latent with implicit and underlying meanings (Braun and Clarke, 2022). For example, questions regarding participants’ reasons for using a smartwatch were explicitly answered, making it obvious to draw semantic meanings. Questions regarding body ideals and conceptions of fitness had underlying assumptions. An example is when participants narrated how self-tracking could help them achieve their perception of a body ideal. Latent coding was used to identify hidden assumptions that informed the semantic content of the data (for example, the code ‘smartwatch as a weight controller’). We started developing themes from codes with similar patterns and meanings to portray how the adoption of self-tracking technologies plays a significant role in encouraging and promoting healthy behaviour change in Ghana. Four refined themes captured the meaning-making process of the observations and interview data: minimising the fear of developing noncommunicable diseases, counteracting a sitting culture, habit hacking, and symbolic power.
Findings and discussion
Minimising the fear of developing non-communicable diseases
On a societal level, Ghana has continually struggled to minimise the incidence of NCDs or lifestyle diseases (Balis et al., 2021). Throughout the interviews, participants emphasised the need to avoid long periods of inactivity to minimise the risks of developing noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). Most of the gym users and communal health walk participants who integrate smartwatches into their fitness practices have either experienced some type of NCD or have close relations with someone who has developed a ‘lifestyle disease’ (Weedon et al., 2020). On an individual level, self-tracking technologies encourage users to manage their health and make informed choices about their well-being (Reichardt and Schober, 2020). Adofo, a fitness instructor who has been working for a popular gym, noted: Many people come to the gym aiming to lose weight or manage their recovery from strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, and sometimes motor accidents. A lot of my clients have started using these watches to take care of their health because they are afraid of dying prematurely. I have seen a lot of people who are also wearing Apple watches to track their heart rate and perhaps control their stress levels. Sometimes, I recommend a smartwatch to them. I do not want any of my clients to experience a heart attack while I am training them.
I continually observed how the participants co-construct their fitness narratives alongside the smartwatch algorithms, merging their health goals with the technology's analytical capabilities. Serwaa, who has been struggling with weight issues, emphasised the need to control her weight. Her father-in-law's passing was a reminder of her own health issues. Though she had started counting her steps, she developed a key interest in tracking her heart rate: I had started putting on too much weight, and I needed to stay fit… I was scared because I have had issues with my heartbeat for some time now. With the watch, I get alerts when my heart rate is too high. I can’t always just go to the hospital and seek medical advice. I usually do quick tests to check my heartbeat. It is not the best, but it is a better option than not knowing at all.
Self-tracking practices imbue the pursuit of self-knowledge and self-awareness so that individuals can strive towards their ‘best self’ (Lupton, 2014a). As smartwatches continue to create a fantasy for knowing numbers (Rettberg, 2014), the distinctions between one's bodily sensations and relying on real-time biometric data become blurred. During aerobic sessions, participants’ sense of self-improvement becomes intimately tied to algorithmic insights. For Kojo and his clients, the persistent use of smartwatches transforms their collective understanding of their health and well-being in ways that directly mirror Lupton's algorithmic subjectivity (Lupton, 2016).
At the end of one Saturday communal walk, Donkor, who started tracking after his father experienced a mild stroke, discussed his workout experiences through the quantified outputs from his smartwatch. ‘I just need to be informed about my health and stay active’, he said. For him, the ability to form a habit of being physically active and avoid extended episodes of inactivity is crucial to reducing the risk factors for NCDs. This is further reiterated by Danso as he tracks his activity levels: My watch gives me a fair idea of what is happening in my body. At my age, I need to track my health. Many of my friends who train with me use a smartwatch… You know it is easy to get a heart attack and stroke these days, so I need to manage my stress levels. This watch can warn me.
Although these socio-algorithmic processes do not represent a neutral, objective source of knowledge (Williamson, 2015: 141), smartwatches render the individual's inner body visible through quantifiable data. Contrary to perceiving smartwatches as mere tools for objective data collection, both the data and the algorithms serve as social agents, exerting considerable impact on individuals’ self-perceptions and worldviews (Lupton, 2013). To this, Nafus and Sherman (2014: 1793) caution about the implicit biases and limitations present in algorithmic interpretations of personal data. In contrast, and as noted above, the participants accepted the smartwatch as a largely infallible technology.
Counteracting a sitting culture
During my second field visit in June 2021, several fitness enthusiasts complained about the heat, though most gyms are insulated with air-conditioners and ceiling fans. After one of the usual aerobic sessions, Nana, who had stopped coming to the gym for about 2 weeks, hinted that the weather is to be blamed here: ‘The weather can be crazy. The heat is unbearable’. For many of the participants I trained with, the weather was usually a concern. My third trip in July-August 2023 was characterised by a period of heavy rains. This also meant that fewer people were joining aerobic sessions. The weather, vehicular traffic, and doomscrolling (particularly on TikTok and other social media reels), make it easier for people to be in extended periods of inactivity. Most middle-class Ghanaians go through their day by being in different sedentary modalities (Mensah et al., 2022). This is a common reality of many Ghanaians, particularly those with desk-bound jobs who spend long hours sitting in office chairs and cars and have limited opportunities for physical activity throughout the day. Osei, who usually worksout with his wife, noted that he feels it is getting more challenging to resist the long periods of sitting: I am always in a car, and when I get to the office, I sit for long hours in the office chair. So, I don’t move a lot. If I do not exercise in the gym at dawn, I am barely active during the day.
Esi, who was mindful of her past sedentary actions, stated: I sleep six to eight hours, sit for breakfast, sit to drive, sit at work, drive back home, sit for dinner, and then sit to watch television until it is bedtime. So, after my morning routine, I get ready for work. At the office, I typically walk to the warehouse just so I can complete more steps during the day. One thing I love about the watch is that every hour it prompts me to be active. Previously, I could sit down for about 5 hours in the office without taking a step. I was worried about not being active at work.
Ohemaa, a health worker who enjoys communal aerobic sessions, shared an opinion regarding how she barely meets her 10,000-step-a-day target as her work duties are mostly desk-bound. She expressed: ‘It is difficult, but I need to meet my step-count target by walking more’. I asked her why the number 10,000 was the goal. She wondered for a while and said that was the default setting when she got the watch. Ohemaa's adherence to the 10,000-step goal without questioning its basis highlights the subtle power of algorithmic subjectivity in shaping her fitness perception. The algorithmic affordances in her Fitbit present 10,000 steps as a default number to stay fit (Adams, 2019; Johnman et al., 2017). For the participants, the gamified and data visualisation of the 10,000 steps and caloric expenditure are examples of how digital self-tracking can encourage users to overcome prolonged physical inactivity.
Habit hacking
Fitness in Ghana is often viewed as a communal activity, with group exercises and community walks being popular choices (Sorkpor et al., 2018). Fitness gathering scenes similar to what Archambault (2021) described in Maputo are not any different from what I observed in Accra and Kumasi. Particularly on Saturday and Sunday mornings, members of local keep-fit clubs convene at various locations throughout the cities, and transform car parks, open spaces in schools and roadsides into vibrant fitness hubs. These makeshift exercise spaces have become instrumental in facilitating a range of physical activities that are central to forming a fitness habit (Antwi et al., 2025). Yet, maintaining an active lifestyle is challenging for many middle-class Ghanaians. Adofo described how some of his clients struggle to keep up with attendance at his aerobic sessions. He blames the vehicular traffic situation: “The traffic in the city is getting worse, and that can discourage many clients from attending my sessions.” Many gym users seem to agree, but they also believe the rising cost of gym membership and family duties make it difficult to attend sessions.
Between November 2020 and July 2021, I observed the growing adoption of smartwatches among fitness enthusiasts. Many participants admitted it was challenging to get into a routine and keep up with regular exercises as much as they wanted. They join keep-fit groups or fitness centres but typically quit after a short time. For them, day-to-day life responsibilities get in the way. One of the many ways smartwatches operate is by encouraging habits (Neff and Nafus, 2016; Peng et al., 2021). Neff and Nafus (2016: 89) use the term ‘habit hacking’ to describe how many self-trackers use data to change old habits and create new ones. The quantified data from the watch is a new way to facilitate the creation of new habits and is therefore seen as a device for forming healthy habits. To get users engaged and hack a habit that is rooted in an active lifestyle, smartwatches incorporate gamified tactics to keep users engaged (Whitson, 2015). The gamification elements in their smartwatches also produce a broader set of routines that encourage self-trackers to reappropriate private and public spaces to meet their physical fitness goals (Antwi et al., 2025). For Danso, the haptic feedback and periodic prompts from the watch are enough to nudge him into being active. He emphasised: My watch regulates my actions in many ways. It has these constant reminders when I have been inactive for a while, and it usually vibrates when it's time to do an activity. For example, anytime I become idle for an hour, the watch prompts me to take 250 steps to stay active. I will just stand up and complete the 250 steps. In a way, this smartwatch is influencing me, but not in a bad way. I would not mind walking to reach my goal and stay in shape. It prompts me to take 250 steps when I become idle for too long. I am always motivated to track my activity levels and what I have done for the day. Sometimes I will just wait for the reminder and then go for a 5-minute walk around my office.
However, users like Mawuli are not exactly encouraged by periodic reminders from their watch. Mawuli is unconvinced about letting a ‘small wrist device’ (as he calls it) dictate his day. For him, that could mean his physical activities are more of a burden than a relief: The watch has been prompting me that I have been idle for a while, but I have not been responding to those prompts. Sometimes, it rewards you for getting out of your idleness, but those things do not encourage me.
For many participants, features like the haptic nudges, real-time tracking of physical health metrics, and the integration of gamification elements are all it takes to engage in regular fitness activities (Windasari and Lin, 2021). As the participants seek to maintain an active lifestyle, the watches offer the freedom and flexibility to set their own physical health goals. They can use their smartwatches in a way that works for them, rather than joining a fitness centre and communal health walk groups where there is a ‘one-size-fits-all’ fitness event.
The symbolic power of the smartwatch
Thus far, our findings have identified ways that the participants use smartwatches towards health and fitness goals. We noticed another function of the watches that was not tied to health and fitness, but no less significant for the users: symbolic power. While smartwatches have become a digital health assistant for many of the participants, the device also plays a symbolic role not only in Ghana's health and fitness landscape but socio-economic dynamics. Particularly for the female participants, smartwatches are more than passive mirrors of users’ activities as the device actively shapes lived experiences and contributes to the structuring of social interactions and fashion exchanges. In this way, smartwatches are used quite consciously in acts of identity construction and constitute part of what Lomborg and Frandsen (2016) describe as the ‘new hype’. This is a decidedly analogue component of users’ subjectivity, which complements the three algorithmic components addressed previously.
The participants emphasised the smartwatch's role as a symbol of fitness and social status even for those who barely exercise. As smartwatches become more and more popular, they do not only serve as functional devices for monitoring health and fitness but also contribute to the construction of one's identity and social status. Osei, who usually comes to the gym with his wife, described what it means to wear a smartwatch. According to him, the mere presence of a smartwatch can shape others’ perceptions of his lifestyle and fitness habits: People think I work out regularly when they see me with the watch. It also makes my friends think that I am very active. A lot of my friends will ask about what kind of exercises I do. I like the fact that the watch can also spark fitness conversations and curiosity among my friends and me.
Esi and Emefa, two women who usually attend an outdoor aerobic session together, alluded to the need to use an Apple watch. They both seem to hint that the Apple brand fits into their fashion sense. They made the following comments: Many of my friends usually see me in different smartwatch colours. I have different wristbands in my bag, so I normally change the bands to match my dress or shoes – Esi. I have bought a few straps for my Apple watch. Sometimes my outfit and handbag determine the strap colour I use for the watch – Emefa.
Haruna, a fitness instructor, has seen many of his clients’ integrating smartwatches into their daily fitness routines. They tend to be high-end brands, which are very often associated with luxury and the upper-middle class, making the device a status symbol. The choice of brand, model, colour, and style of smartwatch communicates subtle messages about the wearer’s fitness ambitions, taste, social standing, and their fashion sense. The different use of wristbands for the same watch is also a testament to how users complement their personal style and overall appearance. This reinforces the symbolic power of smartwatches as the users can display not only their dedication to physical activity and healthy living but also their taste and sense of fashion. Our observations within the Ghanaian fitness communities further emphasise the broader cultural significance of smartwatches beyond their functional purposes. As symbols of modernity, health consciousness, and personal discipline, smartwatches play an increasingly prominent role in shaping social interactions, self-presentation, and collective understanding of fitness and wellness.
Conclusion
We conclude with a particularly poignant statement from Enyonyam, one of the research participants: I feel miserable when I leave my watch at home. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, I feel uncomfortable, especially after charging the watch and forgetting to wear it. I can’t track my activities for the day. I get a little stressed when I can’t monitor my calories, steps, and heart rate. I feel like my day is not complete.
The adoption of smartwatches in Ghana has significant implications across multiple areas of life, including habit formation, sedentary behaviour, digital health management, emotional well-being, and social status. Reflecting on our findings, we contend that smartwatches can facilitate the development of healthier habits by providing real-time feedback on users’ daily routines. In Ghana, where facilities to promote fitness and wellness are constrained, smartwatches can serve as a fitness partner in mitigating lifestyle diseases. Additionally, by enabling users to monitor their health status and detect potential issues early, these devices can contribute to a greater sense of security and peace of mind. This is a promising area for future research and intervention, particularly health-related anxiety, as digital self-tracking is seen as an accurate, effective technique for minimising the fear of developing chronic illness.
As smartwatch users in Ghana reappropriate unconventional sites as fitness and wellness spaces, the watch holds transformative potential. Comparable to how a bike path in the Netherlands or running trail in Norway serves as physical infrastructure supporting active lifestyles, the adoption of smartwatches in Ghana can be understood as a new form of socio-technical infrastructure that enables and promotes health-oriented behaviours. Nonetheless, it is important to note that, unlike bike paths, which are available to all mobile citizens, the cost of smartwatches suggests this type of infrastructure is available only to the middle and upper-middle class.
Despite these clear potential benefits of the adoption of smartwatches, our findings also show distinct points of discomfort, dissatisfaction, or anxiety towards self-tracking. Central to this is the extent to which a new algorithmic subjectivity is taking hold in Ghana. As a relatively new practice, self-tracking does not yet play as dominant a role in subject formation as that outlined by Deborah Lupton. Nonetheless, it is clear in the comments of our participants that smartwatches are more than tools for health and fitness and that they do play a role in identity formation. Ghanaian fitness enthusiasts find feelings of self-worth in their metrics, adopt smartwatches as personal assistants, and recognise the watch's power as a symbol of fitness and social class. In essence, it is crucial to recognise that socio-algorithmic processes are not value-free or detached from social and cultural contexts. The interpretation and application of personal data in shaping self-understanding and decision-making must consider the potential implications of algorithmic subjectivity and the dynamic interaction between technology and human agency.
In looking back across the study, especially through the lens of the Western-centric scholarly work on self-tracking, we wonder about the extent to which we are seeing the neoliberalisation of health and fitness in Ghana. As is clear in many of our examples, Ghanaians’ use of smartwatches shows many parallels to the for-profit, individualistic, responsibilised wellness industry characteristic of Western societies. A recurring question then is the extent to which, in adopting Western-designed smartwatches, Ghanaians are also adopting the attendant healthism discourses and a new conception of wellness. Will Ghanaians develop algorithmic subjectivities that are uniquely Ghanaian, or will the algorithms in smartwatches and their companion apps flatten such subjectivities so that they mirror those in the West? Unlike in Western nations, where the term ‘quantified self’ is used to reference self-tracking's ubiquity in day-to-day life, self-tracking in Ghana is still in its nascent stages. Perhaps what we are seeing in Ghana is the development of what Williamson (2015: 135) describes as ‘algorithmic skin’, which refers to ‘an individual whose physical activities, movement and overall healthiness are at least partly animated by algorithmic processes’. This might be a more useful way to address the topic as it recognises the unique intersection of smartwatches with governmental health initiatives, communal health walks and fitness spaces, and the physical activity of daily labour that is part of the Ghanaian context. It points to the potential for Ghanaians to challenge, resist or tweak Western-based approaches to health and wellness in their own fitness practices.
The question of whether an algorithmic skin may grow into algorithmic subjectivities and a broader quantified self-movement in Ghana is an important one and should be used to drive further research. We point out the need for more and continued research on self-tracking in Ghana, in Africa, and in the Global South more broadly. As we have shown here, the adoption of smartwatches in Ghanaian health and fitness practices is not just about tracking one's exercise. It is also tied to questions about physical and technological infrastructure, government intervention, communal versus individual fitness and lifestyle practices, a changing labour force, as well as the leisure time and disposable income necessary to track one's health. These are some of the main areas that should drive future research into the topic as Ghanaians continue to use smartwatches in their daily lives.
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The second author received research funding through the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
