We all know that exercise is supposed to make us feel better. In fact, even mild exercise can increase endorphins or feel good hormones.
And exercise enthusiasts may know this to be true without needing the science. We’ve all heard of “runner’s high”.
But for some, it may be difficult to see or notice the impact activity has on our mood. And understanding how our mood affects our activity levels adds another layer to consider.
Because day-to-day mood is such an important aspect of our wellbeing, we recently began asking members to keep track of their mood by completing a daily offering asking them how they feel.
In the first two weeks we received 743,401 responses from over 131 thousand members!
Overall, the majority of responses indicated that people were feeling good.
- Good: 56.9% (423,268)
- Okay: 37.3% (277,273)
- Bad: 5.8% (42,860)
The “best” days seem to be Saturday (Good = 59.2%) and Sunday (Good = 58.4%), and the “worst” days seem to be Monday (Bad = 6.1%) and Thursday (Bad = 6.14%).
In this short time, we noticed a significant connection between those who said they felt “good” and their activity, sleep levels, and resting heart rate.
More specifically, we took a look at participating members over the first two weeks and examined the relationship between each individual’s self-reported mood and their steps, sleep, and resting heart rate.
Members who indicated they had a better mood walked more and slept more, and had a lower resting heart rate.
In fact, we observed that "good" days were associated with an increase of nearly 1900 steps when compared to "bad" days
What does that mean?
Well, it shows that for these members at least, mood and activity levels appear to have some connection.
It could be that keeping active makes them feel good. Or maybe, feeling good allows them to keep active.
Curious about how your mood and activity are connected? If you haven’t paired an activity app or wearable to your Evidation app yet, do it today. You’ll earn points for connecting and be eligible to receive more personalized insights.
And stay tuned for more community insights from Evidation!
The daily mood survey is a new offer type we’re currently testing and is only available in the app at this time. If you typically log in on the web, be sure to download the app.
