Smart Rings: How Wearable Gadgets Track Your Health and Stress Levels

Max: Hello, friends! Yulia: Hello everyone! Max: Welcome to the "Russian with Max" project - it's a project for those who are learning Russian. And today Yulia and I will have a dialogue for level B1+, approximately. You can listen to this dialogue as part of our podcast - here is the link to our podcast - and you can also watch it on YouTube. But, honestly, I don't know what will come out first: the video or the podcast - in short, I can't tell you for sure. But I can tell you for sure that we have a rather interesting topic today - Yulia and I want to talk about a device. How do we, Yulia, say "device" in Russian? What options do we have?

Yulia: We say "gadget." Max: Gadget. Yulia: But that's not very Russian either. Yulia: Device. Max: Well, we don't say "device." Yulia: We don't, no. Max: In that context. We say "gadget." Yulia: Gadget, yes. Max: In Russian, we would say "gadget." Just like we use the word "phone," for example-we wouldn't say, "This is a talker." "I'll call you on the talker," right? Max: "And I'll use the talker to record this podcast"-no, of course, that's weird. We use the words "microphone," "phone," "power bank," connected to a "recorder." So, yes, friends, that's reality.

Even the word "cable". And the word "table". well, "chair" is definitely German: stuhl-chair. The word "table". I don't know. Max: I don't know, I don't know. Yulia: Well, that's also unlikely. It's unlikely to be native Russian. Max: "TV". Anyway, let's leave this conversation about borrowing aside. I've always said: language lives as long as. Well, okay, it wasn't me who said that, it's what smart linguists and philologists say, that language lives, language exists, language develops only as long as it borrows words-when it stops borrowing, it dies.

Yulia: I completely agree. Max: Exactly. So, let's get back to our conversation. Today we want to talk about an interesting gadget. Yul, let's show it to you. Yulia: It's a ring. Max: It's a ring. Yulia: And not even an omnipotent one. Max: Unfortunately, it's not an omnipotent one, right? Yulia: That's a shame, yes. Max: Can you tell us in three words, Yul, what kind of ring is this? We won't say what kind of ring it is, but it's, let's say, well, probably. well, it's considered the best ring in this segment-in the smart ring segment in general.

But, Yul, could you please tell us about this smart ring-what it is, what it does-briefly, for those who don't understand what it is. Yulia: Well, Max, as you said, we call it a "smart ring." Why is it smart? Not because it can solve math problems. Max: It can't solve math problems? Yulia: Unfortunately. But this ring has various built-in systems for monitoring the body. Max: So, systems for monitoring the body, your body. Yulia: Yes, that is, various sensors that measure, for example, your heart rate, which can determine when you're sleeping

and monitor your sleep phases, monitor your saturation-that is, the oxygen in your blood-and compile all of this into reports, into some graphs in the app, where the artificial intelligence built into the app analyzes this data and gives you some recommendations, and generally understands how you sleep, what your stress level is, what your heart rate is. Max: And so on. Yulia: And so on, yes. Max: So it turns out that this ring is essentially similar to all sorts of fitness trackers, smartwatches, and so on, which, you know. Well, my watch is completely stupid, you know, but I really love it.

Probably because. never mind. I feel some kind of connection with it. My watch can only count steps, and not very well at that. But there are different fitness trackers, smartwatches that can. well, let's call them the basic functions of such gadgets. What do they usually do? They can count the number of steps you've taken. What else? Yulia: Yes, they generally track, yes, they monitor your activity throughout the day: well, that is, for example, steps, or whether it's running, or whether you've been playing some sport, riding a bike-they can track your activity.

Max: Yes, good-they track your physical activity, that is, you can see how much you've been doing of each sport. Then they-well, these… all these gadgets… it doesn't matter, the form factor can be different: it could be a bracelet, it could be a ring, what else? Are there any other form factors? Yulia: I haven't heard. Max: Well, yes, probably the most well-known ones are bracelets and rings at the moment. Look, they measure your pulse; as you said, saturation. Yulia: Yes, saturation. I'm not sure if watches can measure saturation. Maybe they can now.

Max: Depends on the gadget. Okay, so the gadget-in your case, the ring-collects all this information about your body, and then you can work with this information in an app. Or rather, it's not you who work with it, but the artificial intelligence in the app processes this information and gives you some recommendations, some advice, and shows you what problems you have or may have, right? Yulia: Yes, that's absolutely right. Every morning when you wake up, the app rates your sleep: "You slept at an eighty!"

Max: And what's the maximum score? Yulia: The maximum is a hundred. I've never scored a hundred. Max: You've never. Yulia: 100 points, never. Max: So you've never had perfect sleep, according to the app? Yulia: So that's true. But mine was close to perfect-like, 96-97. Plus, the gadget, yes, monitors your activity level throughout the day, as we said; it roughly calculates how many calories you've burned during the day, your stress level.

Max: So the ring can tell when you've had periods of stress? Yulia: Yes, the ring evaluates your day each day based on whether it was stressful, balanced in terms of stress, or generally calm. It's important to understand that by stress, the ring doesn't mean, I don't know, negative experiences, yes, emotional upheaval. Stress is, well, essentially, any activity that causes an increase in heart rate. But the ring doesn't know: did you run so well, and that's stress for the body, or were you sitting and worrying, I don't know, before the interview - "Oh my God, I'm not going to pass this!" - and your heart rate was high, and that's also stress.

But globally, it doesn't seem to matter for the body - if there was a period of stress, caused by anything, it needs to recover afterwards. Max: I mean. Okay, let's not go too deep into the topic of stress. Yulia: Let's not, yeah. So the ring doesn't decipher whether it was positive stress or negative stress, it just says: "Dude." Max: What were you. "Dude, you." Yulia: "You're stressed!" Max: Yeah. "You're stressed, relax a little. You need to relax."

Yulia: Yeah, it says: "Yesterday was a stress day, yeah, it was a really stressful day. Today I'm telling you that you need to be less active, recover more. Please, try it." Well, and so on, day after day. And it also monitors your stress recovery index (*stress recovery), and depending on whether you've recovered or not, it determines what activity will be more effective for you that day, that is, whether you need more activity or less activity. Max: So, do I understand correctly that if you slept poorly and. Let's say, for example, I slept really poorly today, and yesterday I had a very stressful. "stressful" or "stressful"?

Well, we usually say "stressful," right? Yulia: We say "stressful," yes, in colloquial speech. Max: I wonder, in the Russian language, is it "stressful" or "stressful"? Well, it doesn't matter, in any case, we more often say "stressful" in colloquial speech. So, yesterday was a stressful day, I slept really poorly last night-most likely, the ring will tell me-well, the ring, the app, it doesn't matter-it will tell me that I need to exercise less today. Yulia: That's right. Yes, that's right. It says, like, the baseline calorie intake that it's recommended you burn is,

I don't know, 550. If you've recovered well, it'll be 750, and if you haven't recovered well, you're stressed, it'll say 400. And it will, well, every day, give you some kind of recommendation for the current day. Max: Yes, I just want to point out again for our listeners and viewers that sometimes we say "it" when we mean the gadget-"it." And when we say "it," we mean the ring. That's why. We understand this, but maybe it's not always obvious. Okay, Yulia, but look, the question is, how much can we trust this information? How. To be honest, I find it hard to believe that such a small thing can provide so much information - and most importantly,

that this information is truly relevant, that it. that it can be relied upon. Yulia: That's a good, legitimate question. There are a number of studies that say this ring is effective, but we understand that these studies may not be entirely reliable. But in reality, the most important thing this ring measures is your heart rate, and based on your heart rate, it determines whether you're currently, I don't know, stressed, engaged in some activity, or relaxed. Plus, in addition to your heart rate, it measures your heart rate variability-basically, the pause between heartbeats. And if your variability is higher, it means you're recovered.

Max: Variability or variability? Or what? Yulia: Well, the word "variability" in general. When I was reading about the ring. Max: I didn't know that word. Yulia: Well, it's exactly like fluctuations, or something like that, yes. If your index of these fluctuations is high, it means you're recovered. If it's low, it means you're stressed. Well, it's like this thing can measure, yeah. But what's important to me? What's important to me is that, for example, it somehow. "It" is the thing; "it" is the ring; "he" is the gadget. The ring is "it." It somehow almost always guesses the type of physical activity

I did: if it was a walk, if it was a run, if it was a bike ride. If it was exercise, it says, "Did you do any fitness?" So, somehow, this little thing, this ring, prog. well, that is, it doesn't predict, it guesses. Max: It guesses. Yulia: It guesses what exactly you did. Well, I don't know how, but it's almost never wrong. Max: I see. Well, okay, okay. So, it's clear that how much we can trust this information depends only on us. We took this particular device because at least there is some research, some confirmation that this thing really works. And it's just interesting to experiment - after all, it's not something like…

I don't know, not a blood pressure monitor that you rely on and that should work super-flawlessly. It's something that just helps you understand yourself and your physical condition a little better, right? Yulia: That's right. It's not medical equipment - you can't rely on it for diagnostic purposes. But for me, it's an opportunity to learn more about how my body functions, and maybe try experimenting: what would happen if I actually slept the amount the ring calculated as my norm? Would you feel better or worse? Max: So, what can you say about this?

Yulia: The first two weeks I wore the ring, it simply analyzed various indicators and didn't make any recommendations. Now I've been wearing it for almost three months - it determined that my norm for sleep is seven and a half hours. Max: Is seven and a half hours your norm? Yulia: that this is optimal for me. And it shows that if, for example, you don't get enough sleep, how you accumulate sleep debt. I now have sleep debt. Max: So, well, have you tried sleeping as much as the ring tells you? And did you feel like that's what you need?

Yulia: Yes, I tried sleeping as much as the ring says, and I do see a correlation that when the ring says, "You slept at a 96, your readiness index for this day is 98," I really do feel better on those days. Max: What was your index today? Yulia: Today, by the way, it's 86. Max: Well, that's not bad. Yulia: That's not bad, yes - it's always like this… this "above expectations" position. There you go. Well, it really is… And if you didn't sleep well, you see how low it ranks your indicators, and you really don't feel very energetic on those days.

And, well, that's really interesting. Another interesting thing is that this ring seems to encourage you to move more-well, that's how it works for me. It's always been like this: if it tells you, "Okay, just twenty-nine more minutes of brisk walking and you'll meet your daily goal," I'm more likely to take action to meet it. Max: I see, so it motivates you? Yulia: It motivates me. Max: Okay, so it works for you. And you might also notice that the sleep recommendations work for you, too. Yulia: The sleep recommendations work. Plus, I've noticed that at some point, the ring rates each day as stressful-

Just day after day: "You've had a stressful day." And I read what you can do about it: for example, there are recommendations for breathing, like just sit down and breathe calmly for three minutes. Max: Did you do that? Yulia: Yes, I do that now. Max: Every day? Yulia: Yes, I try to every day, because there are various studies that show that calm breathing at a certain rhythm helps you recover from stress faster (*recover from stress). And indeed, if a ring tells you every day that you've had a stressful day, you seem to want to try to change something. Max: Yul, why a ring and not some kind of bracelet?

Yulia: I used to have a smartwatch - it broke at some point. Plus, a ring is more comfortable to wear, and it looks nice, too. Max: So, the aesthetic part? Yulia: Yes. Max: Well, from what I've heard, it's much less comfortable to sleep with a bracelet. So, you sleep with the ring and, basically, don't experience much discomfort, but sleeping with a watch or a bracelet-well, it's not much fun.

Yulia: Well, I agree, yes. Max: Okay, so tell me, have your behavior, your habits changed at all after three years. ha-ha-ha, "three years"-after three months of wearing the ring? Yulia: I don't think your habits have changed very much yet, but, as I said, I started paying attention to my stress level and looking for ways to reduce it-at least try breathing. Plus, the ring seems to stimulate you, encourages you to move more, and still try to go to bed earlier. So, it's basically obvious, yes, that you need to go to bed earlier, but the ring seems to remind you of it-

and that's cool, that's convenient. Plus, the ring used one of its indicators to estimate your cardio age-well, like, your heart age (probably not entirely accurate). And it measured that my cardio age is a year and a half older than my real age! Max: So, roughly speaking, your heart is a little older than it should be? Yulia: Yeah, it says that this is a completely normal correlation, but it says that "if you want to rejuvenate your heart, add cardio to your life." And I'm like, "You need to run in the mornings." Max: Have you started running in the mornings?

Yulia: I have. Now I've given up, but I hope that I'll come back. Max: Okay, fine. Let's talk about the downside then, because I've heard that for many people, wearing such rings or bracelets and generally receiving information about their health, heart rate, well, heart age - well, not heart age, but we understand - is additional stress for them. That is, some people, when they see that something is wrong with them, they start to stress; when they see that they don't move enough, they start to stress; When they see that their heart is a little older than they would like, they start to panic - and this, on the contrary, drives them into depression.

Yulia: So you're saying that this is when the ring becomes your master? Max: Well, no, not when the ring becomes your master - when you simply react excessively emotionally to some information that something might not be as good as you thought. But this also applies to visits to the doctor, and, for example, some tests that people take, or just check-ups - when you go. Well, I feel it - for example, I'm a little scared to go for a check-up, because what if something comes out - and that's it, and I'll become depressed and won't be able to function normally. Doesn't this also work for some people with rings?

Yulia: I think it can work the way you described - that when you see that something is wrong, you start to worry more about it. And the second point-what I said: the ring becomes your master-means you're trying to live up to all the standards the ring has set for you. "I definitely need to burn as many calories as the ring says!" "I definitely need to sleep as much time as the ring says!" And that doesn't always correlate adequately with your real life. And you start to worry because "I needed to go to bed at 10 PM, but I couldn't." That's the second negative effect. Max: So. well, it's not an effect, it's. how can I put it?

It's. well, I wouldn't call it an effect, because it's simply people's perception. Yulia: Well, perception, yes. Max: And many people can perceive information differently, and either worry about the fact that. well, the information doesn't match what they think, or worry about not being able to live up to some ideal the ring offers. So. Do you have something like that? Yulia: No. Max: No? Yulia: Honestly, no. As for the first problem you mentioned-that if you see that something is wrong and you start to stress about it-well, I'm more of a person who likes to get tested as a preventative measure.

That is, I'll feel calmer if I know what's going on right now-I'd prefer to know. And the second point, yes, the second problem is that you start to adapt to the ring's norms-well, unfortunately or fortunately, that's not at all typical for me. So, I take the information into account, but real life will probably still win out - if I realize I can't go to bed at 10 pm because I have some other things to do, plans, and so on - well, I won't go to bed, basically, I won't worry about it. Max: I see. So, this isn't all about you? Yulia: It's not about me, no.

Max: Thank you, Yulia. I'd like to summarize everything we've talked about. So, a ring or a fitness tracker are gadgets that help you get different information about your physical condition… about your physical condition. And they have different sensors - in general, this is a synonym: sensor and sensor - which measure your pulse, your, say, heartbeat… Not your heartbeat, but you said that… Yulia: Variability, variability… I don't know what the right word is here. Fluctuations, yes. Cardiac… fluctuations in heart rate. Max: But not a pulse. It's not just a pulse.

Yulia: It's not just a pulse. Max: Okay, pulse, and some other things. So it turns out that the gadget gives you various recommendations, tailored specifically to you, and you can either follow these recommendations or not-basically, do with this knowledge as you wish. How would you rate the effectiveness of this ring, Yulia? I mean, how well does it work for you? Did you have any expectations when you wanted to get this ring? Yulia: I think my expectations were met, because I expected exactly what you just said-the ability to receive data about my body.

I didn't expect the built-in neural network, the built-in artificial intelligence, to give me some super-useful personalized recommendations that differ from, well, common sense-like, sleep more, eat more healthy food, move more. But I was really curious to track how your condition changes from day to day, how you feel on days when, say, some indicators are higher, some are lower - and this ring, basically, gives me the opportunity to monitor these indicators. Its effectiveness in terms of influencing my personal habits is probably a 6 or 7. Because… Max: Out of 10? Yulia: Out of 10. Because, well, I'm probably a little less ready to change anything in my life based on what the ring told me.

Maybe I should take some recommendations more seriously - I haven't been able to yet, so for me, its effectiveness is a 6. Max: Okay. The last question that someone might ask, who watches us, listens to us and says: "Well, it's all the same - get enough sleep, eat better, and stress less - well, basically, it's all clear, why do I need this ring?" Yulia: Indeed, it's all clear. But when you see how, say, lack of sleep or excess stress, yes, or maybe, say, a late night-going to bed late-it directly affects you, you begin to perceive it somehow more personally, or something.

Because, overall, the recommendations are really general-they haven't come up with anything supernatural or revolutionary. But here it seems to give you the opportunity to see, like, from your experience and digitize it a little. Max: Personalized. Yulia: Personalized, yes. And to get some data in numbers-digitize it. Because globally, you know that you, say, didn't get enough sleep, but here you can see how many times you woke up, how much deep sleep you had, you know, light sleep, and then, well, draw some conclusions for yourself about. When is the best time for you to go to bed, how do you sleep?

Max: I see. Thank you very much. Friends, that's all from us. If you want to practice Russian more effectively and develop your listening skills, improve your vocabulary, and even improve your speaking skills with each podcast, then join our membership program - the link will be in the description under the video or in the podcast description if you listen to it in your podcast app. By the way, you can also rate this podcast there, and we would be very, very pleased. We will definitely send you our heart - so there you have it.

Well, friends, thank you! See you in the next podcasts, the next videos. Yulia, thank you very much. Let me shake your hand with the ring. Yulia: Thank you, Max. Max: And see you again. Yulia: See you again! Max: Bye-bye! Yulia: Bye-bye!