Passively sensing anxiety and depression symptoms in daily life among middle-aged adults

Depression and anxiety are prevalent among 20% of adults. Laboratory studies have demonstrated associations between depression, anxiety and slowed gait. Therefore, the aim of this study is to explore the associations between ecological momentary assessments and daily life gait characteristics derived from naturalistic accelerometer signals. We collected phone-based gait data ( n = 57) for 90 consecutive days and wrist and hip data ( n = 17) for 7 consecutive days. We examined interactions between the gait phenotypes defined by cadence and peak height. We found that participants with high cadence and high peak height in their gait were less likely to be depressed or anxious. For the wrist-worn actigraph, decreased counts were associated with increased anxiety symptoms. These findings provide preliminary evidence for integrating passively sensed gait biomarkers into clinical monitoring of anxiety and depression.