The double-edged sword of self-tracking: investigating factors of technostress in performance-oriented cycling and triathlon
Participants
n=13 performance-oriented amateur triathletes (full text, checked 2026-09-27 — the abstract gives no sample size); 5 women, 8 men, aged 24-64 (mean 37.8), training 6-16 h/week (full text, checked 2026-09-27)
Protocol
Qualitative research approach: guided (problem-centred) interviews with performance-oriented amateur triathletes
Interviews in the preseason, Feb-May 2023; 17+ hours of audio, mean 80 min per interview; deductive + inductive content analysis with 1,575 codes assigned (full text, checked 2026-09-27)
Theoretical framework: Transactional Stress Model (Lazarus & Folkman) (full text, checked 2026-09-27)
Key Results
16 technostress factors identified
8 transferred from the occupational context: information overload, distraction, unavailability, loss of control, lack of sense of achievement, unreliability, complexity, self-monitoring
8 new, sport-specific: performance-enhancement imperative, lack of context, digital visibility, feedback incorporation, measurement data fixation, comparison pressure, permanent monitoring, perception discrepancy (device data overriding the athlete's own body perception)
Code frequencies (full text, checked 2026-09-27): measurement data fixation was the most-coded factor (113 codes), comparison pressure 100, perception discrepancy 17; 11 of 13 athletes reported deliberately reducing movement while their watch charged, and pausing recordings at traffic lights to protect averages
The authors position the findings as a basis for interventions such as adaptive training programmes or personalised feedback systems, and as a starting point for research on coping strategies
Mechanism
Self-tracking has a dual nature — it structures training while generating stress of its own. Interpretation (ours, not the paper's statistics): athletes come to treat unrecorded effort as valueless, and device data can override subjective body perception, creating dependency on external validation of internal states.
Practical Application
Interviews with performance-oriented amateur triathletes surfaced 16 sources of self-tracking stress — 8 familiar from work (information overload, loss of control, unreliability…) and 8 new to sport, including measurement data fixation, comparison pressure, permanent monitoring and perception discrepancy, where the device's number overrides what the body says. The data that organises your training can also be the thing that stresses you.
Athletes need self-regulatory strategies balancing tech feedback with intuitive body awareness; coaches should validate subjective perception alongside data
Not from this paper; the base's own practice: periodic device-free sessions to keep the connection with body signals; avoid checking metrics during recovery/easy sessions
Measurement data fixation was the most frequently coded factor (full text, checked 2026-09-27) — code count is not a measure of harm, so "the strongest stressor" is a reading of prominence, not of damage
Limitations
Small qualitative sample (13 triathletes recruited through German clubs and a training camp), interviewed February-May 2023 while most were in training for the season (full text, checked 2026-09-27)
Social desirability bias in interviews
No coping strategy analysis — named by the authors as future work
Qualitative — no performance measurement, no frequencies that generalise
How this entry was checked and changed
Content correction 2026-09-27
Sample (n=13, 5F/8M, ages, hours/week), interview logistics (Feb-May 2023, 17+ h, 80 min, 1,575 codes) and code counts (113, 100, 17, 11/13) -> not in the abstract; kept as labelled full-text numbers.
"Measurement data fixation is the strongest stressor — more damaging than social comparison" -> the paper's code frequency does not measure damage; reworded.
Cross-reference labels pointed at the wrong entry or named the wrong author (checked against each cited entry's byline); repointed to the entry the label describes, or removed where the base holds no such paper.
Lines labelled "full text; not checked against the abstract" were checked against the open-access full text (PMC11608990): every number in them appears there; relabelled "full text, checked 2026-09-27".
Lines labelled "full text; not checked" were read against the open-access full text (PMC11608990): 2 confirmed and relabelled; 1 corrected to what the paper says.