The operating system of Android and iOS devices collects sensor data in two approaches: Continuous (e.g. pedometer) or Episodic (e.g. GPS). In the continuous approach, the device's operating system continuously collects data. The OS then provides all the collected data to the Ethica app when Ethica queries it from the device. For example, Android and iPhone devices continuously count the user's steps. If a study has the Pedometer sensor enabled, the Ethica app queries the pedometer data once every 5 minutes, but it gets the total number of steps taken since the last request. So even though the Ethica app queries data once every 5 minutes, it collects all steps taken by the participant. Similarly, Android and iPhone always check whether the screen is on or off. When screen state changes, the OS notifies the Ethica app, regardless of the 5-minute data query interval.