HYPOTHESIS AND THEORY article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Sport Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1634267
This article is part of the Research TopicMotivations For Physical Activity - Volume IVView all 23 articles
Applying Self-Determination Theory to Behavior Change Technologies: Insights from Two Projects in the Health Domain
Provisionally accepted
- 1Universitat Siegen, Siegen, Germany
- 2Ubiquitous Design / Experience and Interaction, Siegen, Germany
- 3Aalborg University Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- 4Aalborg Universitet Institut for Arkitektur Design og Medieteknologi, Aalborg, Denmark
- 5Multisensory Experience Lab, Copenhagen SV, Denmark
- 6Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet, Trondheim, Norway
- 7Department of Psychology, Faculty of Social and Educational Sciences, Trondheim, Norway
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In the health domain, patients often need to adopt and maintain behaviors that are tedious, unpleasant, or even painful, such as taking medication regularly, being more physically active, or maintaining a diet. Behavior change technologies (BCTs) can play a crucial role in instilling change and maintaining healthy behaviors. One psychological theory to guide the design of BCTs is Self-Determination Theory (SDT). However, researchers within Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) struggle with its application, as the field lacks a shared understanding and reflection on the use of SDT. We present two HCI research projects in the health domain and reflect on the role SDT played in their implementation. Through a comparative analysis, we found that SDT was helpful in providing an analytical focus and guiding quantitative evaluations. However, its adaptation to qualitative methods and explicit design guidelines presents difficulties. Our reflection underscored the potential of SDT as both a theoretical lens and practical design tool for developing autonomy-supportive health technologies.
Keywords: self-determination theory, health behavior change, Autonomous Motivation, Reflection, Rehabilitation
Received: 23 May 2025; Accepted: 23 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Gerstenberg, Høeg, Van Der Kaap-Deeder and Hassenzahl. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Rebecca Gerstenberg, rebecca.gerstenberg@uni-siegen.de
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