September 22, 2021 Understanding the Unique Affordances of Digital Self Tracking for Adolescents Author(s): MCTD Cambridge Priscilla du Preez for Unsplash Gina Neff and Jaimie Lee Freeman suggest self-tracking research move away from a ‘one size fits all approach’ and begin to highlight the differences in practices from adults and across adolescents. Adults’ digital self-tracking practices are relatively well studied, but in this latest publication from Gina Neff and Jaimie Lee Freeman, they suggest these pre-existing models of digital self-tracking do not fit for how adolescents use these technologies. In this article, they apply the mechanisms-and-conditions framework of affordance theory to examine adolescents’ imagined affordances of self-tracking apps and devices. Based on qualitative data from an online survey of 16–18-year-olds in the UK, they find three key themes in how adolescents imagine the affordances of digital self-tracking: (1) the variability of use across adolescents and with adults, (2) the role of the social control of data in school settings, and (3) the salience of social comparisons among their peers. Using these findings, they show how social and institutional configurations come to matter for technological affordances. By examining adolescents’ imagined affordances for self-tracking, Professor Neff suggest self-tracking research move away from a ‘one size fits all approach’ and begin to highlight the differences in practices from adults and across adolescents.