Measuring Changes in Upper Body Movement Due to Fasting Using a Camera

Understanding activity levels during fasting is important for promoting healthy fasting practices. While most existing studies focus on step counts to objectively assess the impact of fasting on activity levels and behavioral changes, the results have been mixed. Despite evidence showing that individuals spend a significant amount of time sitting while fasting, there has been no objective measurement of body movement or activity levels during sitting and fasting. This research employs a video-based, unobtrusive human body movement measurement system to monitor upper body movements during fasting and non-fasting periods over several days. Key movement features, such as inactivity, movement speed, and movement scale, were automatically extracted from the video monitoring data using a computer vision pipeline. These features were then statistically compared using <i>t</i> tests between fasting and non-fasting periods, analyzed by hour of the day and across different days. The results of the monitoring of five participants during typical daily sitting office work and fasting for 3-5 days indicate no consistent pattern of upper body movement changes due to fasting among the participants.