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E-Health and fitness in Ecuador: A social media based analysis

Abstract:

The growing interest of our society for health issues and physical activities is reflected on social media services where people share information about their daily activities and accomplishments. Fitness activities has become a routine present in many people's daily activities. Previous studies have analyzed people commitment to enhance their lifestyle and reach health objectives using data published in social platforms such as Twitter. However, there is a lack of designed metrics to quantify how users are engaged in physical activities in different areas of a given city. In this study, we collect and analyze 55K tweets posted by people in Ecuador, through different mobile applications, reflecting their participation on fitness and sport activities. Aggregating individual posts at city level, we uncover geographical patterns and dynamics of citizen activities in cities and states. Thus, we illustrate the potential of geolocated posts of people on social media services as sociometers of cities' health and fitness activities.