Understanding behaviours in context using mobile sensing

Mobile sensing refers to the collection of methods by which researchers derive measures of human behaviours and contexts from the onboard sensors and logs found in smartphones, wearables and smart home devices. By tracking real-world behaviours in their natural contexts automatically, unobtrusively, continuously and in detail over extended periods of time, mobile sensing can help researchers to realize the potential of ecological approaches to psychology. In this Review, we consider how mobile sensing presents new opportunities for understanding behaviours in context and review illustrative findings from mobile sensing studies in psychology in three areas of research: social behaviours in physical and digital contexts, mobility behaviours in spatial contexts, and activities in digital contexts. In doing so, we highlight themes in the existing research and demonstrate the capabilities of mobile sensing, while evaluating how far mobile sensing has come in delivering on the promise of ecological approaches. To guide future mobile sensing research in psychology, we conclude with a research agenda focused on conceptual and measurement issues, pursuing explanatory and predictive research, and overcoming technical and practical barriers. Mobile sensing methods can overcome methodological challenges to naturalistic observation and facilitate research about the link between everyday behaviours and psychological constructs. In this Review, Harari and Gosling describe illustrative findings from mobile sensing studies in psychology and propose a research agenda to guide future work.