Oct. 3, 2025
While developing the forthcoming CommitFit smartphone app, Health Psychology department chair Crystal Lim and colleagues decided to take advantage of the adolescent tendency to be immersed in one’s phone. To tackle adolescent obesity, the app gamifies healthy living — and even rewards it financially.
Lim’s interim study looked at whether adolescent-parent pairs would use the app together in a buddy system to improve their health by getting more sleep, exercise, fruits, vegetables and water, or by imbibing fewer sugary drinks. Study participants chose one or more health goals, received reminders and logged their behavior for three months.
In one of two experimental groups, the adolescents also could earn up to $52.50 by accumulating successes. Results were promising: Both groups improved, but the compensation group was 60% more likely to reach health goals. Their parents also were more likely to achieve goals.
Lim said CommitFit promises widespread access to high-quality weight-loss help. That goes for people in food deserts, where access to grocery stores and healthy restaurants is limited, or food swamps, where high-fat and high-calorie offerings such as fast-food restaurants and convenience stores dominate the market.
