Approved research

Population-level associations between activity and mood disorders.

Lay summary

In the most recent publication of 'Measuring National Well-being', over 1 in 6 people showed some evidence of depression or anxiety. It is well known that there are relationships between activity, sleep, and mood disorders. With the continuing development and ubiquity of smartphones and fitness-related wearables, there is an opportunity to use the continuous streams of data they produce to build up models of behaviour that can be used to understand or detect serious mood disorders. Over the next 30 months, this study aims to tease out how some of the relationships between activity, sleep, and mood disorders differ between people, and whether those relationships can be grouped, using activity data from UK Biobank participants who undertook using a wrist-worn accelerometer for a week. The use of wearable devices to remotely monitor disease is an exciting area which could provide greater understanding of disease status, progression, or aetiology to clinicians, patients, and researchers alike. Being able to remotely track the occurrence and progression of series changes in mood could show more easily and immediately success of treatment, show how certain mood disorders manifest in behaviour at an individual level, and help people understand their symptoms.