This article starts out asking, can ai help people quit smoking? Based on this new technology, it seems that the answer is YES!
The company Solutions4Health came up with an app idea that uses AI technology to help people quit smoking. This is done by having people vape instead. Bella is the AI technology that the company came up with.
The reason vapes are used is that they are much safer than tobacco. This app and vape will be able to adapt to users personal needs. This seems very helpful because everyone’s quitting journey is so different and should be catered to each individual.
The AI stop smoking coach is called Bella. You can download it for free as an app and you’ll be able to talk to her normally. The advanced technology will know how to respond fluidly and appropriately. She’s meant to be used as a motivator if you’re ever stuck and not sure how to continue to stop smoking. Of course, to make this even better it is a 24/7 option so there is always personalized advice available.
This is a very smart idea for many reasons. First, vaping is much healthier than smoking so it is smart to have an option for people who are trying to quit. The idea of AI technology to help for this can be very helpful. It is personalized and should be able to be more effective than general ways that people might try to quit smoking. This is a very good idea and is definitely a better option than smoking.
This is a very intuitive and helpful solution to the problem of nicotine addiction in my opinion. I think talking about addiction, and hearing suggestions can help quit. The fact that this AI is personalized and able to talk to you is very intuitive. I am interested to see how talking could actually stop addiction and if the AI would do an effective job of keeping smokers distracted from the urge of wanting to smoke. According to the quit with Bella website, the AI will tell jokes to keep you from smoking, and I’m not sure how much more effective this will be than talking to someone in real life. I know from personal experience with people in my life that are addicted, and I don’t know how effective an app will be in stopping this sort of thing, but it is an interesting idea, and an innovative use of technology for a good purpose.
https://www.quitwithbella.com
I think Bella is a good idea in theory, but maybe not in reality. Think about health apps, which seem to work in a very similar way to Bella. People use them for some time after they download them but are they able to use it consistently? Do they have the discipline to keep going, day after day, week after week? It’s just an app after all, not a parent, professor or coach. I say this because I’ve used health apps before and I never actually carry through with it for more than a few weeks. According to a CBS article I’ve attached, a NYU study found that 46% of people who downloaded a health app eventually just stopped using them. While it’s not the exact same concept, I imagine that percentage would be much higher for Bella users because of the addiction factor with smoking.
Also, according to the British Heart Foundation, even though vaping significantly mitigates health risks, it doesn’t exactly provide a solution – it’s like taking a painkiller instead of going to the doctor to find the actual problem.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/many-americans-download-health-apps-then-ignore-them/
https://www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/heart-matters-magazine/news/e-cigarettes
This app reminds me of the health tracker apps that have been created for other purposes, such as calorie tracker and water intake tracker. Personally, I think one of the key factors that depend on the success of these apps is the usability and the ease of using the interface thats provided, as we learned in class. If the app takes a lot of steps to track its respective criteria, then I have found that people tend to quit using the app very quickly. From personal experience, I had a water intake tracker app and I stopped using it because it took more than a minute for me to record how much I consumed every time I drank water. Because of this, it became tedious for me to record using this app and I stopped using it very quickly after I downloaded the app, due to the arduous usability features. Similarly, I think that this app to quit smoking is a very ingenious idea; however its effectiveness depends solely on its layout and ease of navigations. I think this app has a lot of potential and with continuous improvements in terms of layout and usability features, I think it could really combat the smoking crisis that we are experiencing today.
Check out this article that outlines some methods that make an app useful and effective!
https://www.mobileappdaily.com/2018/09/17/methods-to-avoid-mobile-app-usability-issues