Patent 7297088 was granted and assigned to Seiko Instruments on November, 2007 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
To enhance precision in measurement of the number of steps even when a walk cycle changes. An acceleration detecting portion outputs a walk signal corresponding to a walk of a user detected by a walk sensor. A step number counting portion of a counting portion counts each signal which is judged to be beyond a first reference cycle range by a walk cycle comparing portion among signals from the acceleration detecting portion as the number of steps for one step, and when an extra-regulation step number processing portion judges that a predetermined number of signals each within a second reference cycle range among the signals each beyond the first reference cycle range is continuously outputted, counts the predetermined number of signals as the predetermined number of steps.