Anxiety or Accommodation? How Wearable Tech Reveals What Your Body Actually Needs

<5 minute read

Copyright © 2018-2025 Dr David P Ruttenberg. All rights reserved.

Using wearable tech to pinpoint the difference between anxiety and environmental stress—visualizing data to guide accommodations or therapeutic intervention.

Introduction:

Is work stress making hearts race because of real anxiety or is it simply too many meetings, bad lighting, and constant interruptions? The dilemma of distinguishing clinical anxiety from bad environments used to rely on guesswork, but advances in wearable tech and real-time biosignal analytics are transforming how we answer this question (Dao et al., 2024; Lazarou & Exarchos, 2024).

The Rise of Data-Driven Stress Insights

It’s not just anecdotal: heart rate variability (HRV), electrodermal activity (EDA), and skin temperature—continuously monitored—are offering robust, actionable signals of stress and anxiety (Sahu et al., 2018). Recent studies show that combined models using commercial sensors yield up to 97% accuracy detecting baseline versus anxious states in controlled experiments (Ong et al., 2021). These markers aren’t theoretical—they are now being adopted in research clinics, remote work programs, and by savvy individuals. EDA, for instance, has emerged as a highly sensitive indicator, able to distinguish environmental stress from personal anxiety triggers in workplace settings (Dao et al., 2024; Lazarou & Exarchos, 2024).

Two Case Studies: Wearable Accommodation vs. Intervention

Case 1: Environmental Stressor Wins

Alex’s wearable flagged late-morning EDA surges after noisy stand-ups in a glass-walled office, but HRV returned to baseline soon after. Intervention? Lighting, sound, and space tweaks that brought EDA back under control—no therapy required (Dao et al., 2024).

Case 2: Chronic Anxiety Needs Therapy

Jamie’s HRV dropped and EDA rose no matter the time or office adjustments. After biofeedback training and targeted clinical intervention, both baseline and reactivity improved—supporting desk changes, but putting therapy center stage (Sahu et al., 2018).

Why These Markers Matter

Wearables grounded in robust physiological science—like HRV, EDA, and even skin temperature—monitor the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system in real time, enabling far more objective insight than subjective self-reports alone (Lazarou & Exarchos, 2024; Ong et al., 2021). For anxiety, EDA provides a near-direct readout of sympathetic arousal, while HRV captures longer-term regulatory capacity. The combination is what allows precise, personalized recommendations whether to “change the environment” or “seek therapy” (Sahu et al., 2018).

Organizational Impact and Ethical Guardrails

As companies roll out aggregated stress monitoring (with proper de-identification and consent), group-level HRV data is helping target organizational interventions, reduce burnout, and fine-tune work environments (Lazarou & Exarchos, 2024). Ethical use, privacy, and transparency are non-negotiables, with leading vendors building consent-first frameworks (Ong et al., 2021).

Your Decision Tree: Accommodation or Anxiety?

If spikes correlate strongly with place, schedule, or colleagues, pursue accommodations.

If low HRV/chronically high EDA follow everywhere, blend clinical intervention into your strategy.

Pilot environmental changes and biofeedback practices, then use data to confirm what works.

Call to Action

Download the “Anxiety or Accommodation” worksheet here and map your next move, then post your results using the hashtag #WearableWisdom.

#WearableTech #Anxiety #MentalHealth #Biofeedback #WorkplaceWellness

About the Author:

Dr David Ruttenberg PhD, FRSA, FIoHE, AFHEA, HSRF is a neuroscientist, autism advocate, Fulbright Specialist Awardee, and Senior Research Fellow dedicated to advancing ethical artificial intelligence, neurodiversity accommodation, and transparent science communication. With a background spanning music production to cutting-edge wearable technology, Dr Ruttenberg combines science and compassion to empower individuals and communities to thrive. Inspired daily by their brilliant autistic daughter and family, Dr Ruttenberg strives to break barriers and foster a more inclusive, understanding world.

Call to Action: Share, Question, and Advocate

If you’ve ever felt misunderstood by society’s take on neurodivergent stress, share your experience, cite the science, and champion a smarter, more compassionate response! Visit other my other blog posts and my podcasts here. Share your story, and join the movement for authentic self-advocacy!

References

Dao, J., Liu, R., Solomon, S., & Solomon, S. (2024). State anxiety biomarker discovery: Electrooculography and electrodermal activity in stress monitoring. arXiv preprint arXiv:2411.17935.

Lazarou, E., & Exarchos, T. P. (2024). Predicting stress levels using physiological data: Real-time stress prediction models utilizing wearable devices. AIMS Neuroscience, 11(2), 76–102. https://doi.org/10.3934/Neuroscience.2024006

Sahu, N. K., Gupta, S., & Lone, H. R. (2018). Assessing HRV and HR dynamics with wearables during socially anxious situations. arXiv preprint arXiv:2501.01471v1.

Ong, J. L., Lo, J. C., & Chee, M. W. L. (2021). Detecting subclinical social anxiety using physiological data from a wrist-worn wearable: Small-scale feasibility study. JMIR Formative Research, 5(10), e32656. https://doi.org/10.2196/32656

Picard, R. W., & Healey, J. (2001). Toward machine emotional intelligence: Analysis of affective physiological state. IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, 23(10), 1175–1191.