I’m very excited about ResearchKit and the potential it has to revolutionize how research is conducted. It is certainly not without its problems, most notably the bias it inherently introduces by only including iOS users. The graph at the bottom of this post highlights another problem—initial excitement but precipitous drop-off in engagement. This developer had a 50% dropoff in less than a month. [1]

This graph doesn’t look too different than such graphs I’ve seen for most apps. People try things out and only a small fraction stay engaged. Unfortunately, that introduces a huge bias when talking about research. ↩