research-article

Actively engaging older adults in the development and evaluation of tablet technology

Authors:

Elizabeth Ozanne,

John DownsAuthors Info & Claims

OzCHI '12: Proceedings of the 24th Australian Computer-Human Interaction Conference

Pages 643 - 652

https://doi.org/10.1145/2414536.2414633

Published: 26 November 2012 Publication History

Abstract

In this paper we describe a multi-faceted approach for engaging older adults in the design and evaluation of a tablet application. Our approach consisted of five key elements: 1) involving care providers in the research, 2) conducting social events, 3) supporting use of the technology through scaffolding, 4) providing multiple channels of communication between participants and researchers, and 5) progressively revealing the technology functions. We explored this approach with seven participants (aged 71-92) who used a prototype iPad application to engage in peer-to-peer communication. We found that each of the five elements contributed to successfully engaging older people in the development and evaluation process. This paper provides insights into suitable approaches for designing technologies with older users, illustrating the importance of creating a supportive environment and employing strategies that help to build participants' confidence, both in using the technology and in participating in the design and evaluation process.

References

[1]

Blythe, M. A., Monk, A. F., & Doughty, K. Socially dependable design: The challenge of ageing populations for HCI. Interacting with Computers, 17, 6 (2005), 672--689.

Digital Library

[2]

Coleman, G. W., Gibson, L., Hanson, V. L., Bobrowicz, A., & McKay, A. Engaging the disengaged: How do we design technology for digitally excluded older adults?. In Proc. DIS 2010, ACM Press (2010), 175--178.

Digital Library

[3]

David, J., Benjamin, W., Baecker, R., Gromala, D., & Birnholtz, J. Living with pain, staying in touch: Exploring the communication needs of older adults with chronic pain. Ext. Abstracts CHI 2011, ACM Press (2011), 1219--1224.

Digital Library

[4]

Dewsbury, G., Rouncefield, M., Sommerville, I., Onditi, V., & Bagnall, P. Designing technology with older people. Universal Access in the Information Society, 6 (2007), 207--217.

Digital Library

[5]

Doyle, J., Skrba, Z., McDonnell, R., & Arent, B. (2010). Designing a touch screen communication device to support social interaction amongst older adults. In Proc. BCS Interaction Specialist Group, British Computer Society (2010), 177--185).

Digital Library

[6]

Edlin-White, R., Cobb, S., Floyde, A., Lewthwaite, S., Wang, J., & Riedel, J. From guinea pigs to design partners: Working with older people in ICT design. In P. Langdon, J. Clarkson, P. Robinson, J. Lazar & A. Heylighen (Eds.), Designing Inclusive Systems. Springer-Verlag (2012), 155--164.

[7]

Eisma, R., Dickinson, A., Goodman, J., Mival, O., Syme, A., & Tiwari, L. Mutual inspiration in the development of new technology for older people. In Proc. Int. Conf. on Inclusive Design and Communications (2003).

[8]

Garattini, C., Wherton, J., & Prendergast, D. Linking the lonely: an exploration of a communication technology designed to support social interaction among older adults. Universal Access in the Information Society, 11, 2 (2012), 211--222.

Digital Library

[9]

Gaver, W., Boucher, A., Bowers, J., Blythe, M., Jarvis, N., Cameron, D., et al. The Photostroller: Supporting diverse care home residents in engaging with the world. In Proc. CHI 2011, ACM Press (2011), 1757--1766.

Digital Library

[10]

Hanson, V. L. Influencing technology adoption by older adults. Interacting with Computers 22 (2010), 502--509.

Digital Library

[11]

Hutchinson, H., Mackay, W., Westerlund, B., Bederson, B. B., Druin, A., Plaisant, C., et al. Technology probes: Inspiring design for and with families. In Proc. CHI 2003, ACM Press (2003), 17--24.

Digital Library

[12]

Karahasanovic, A., Brandtzaeg, P. B., Heim, J., Luders, M., Vermeir, L., Pierson, J., et al. Co-creation and user-generated content - elderly people's user requirements. Computers in Human Behaviour, 25 (2009), 655--678.

Digital Library

[13]

Lindley, S. E., Harper, R., & Sellen, A. Designing for elders: Exploring the complexity of relationships in later life. In Proc. 22nd British HCI Group Annual Conf. on People and Computers, British Computer Society (2008), 77--86.

Digital Library

[14]

Lindsay, S., Jackson, D., Schofield, G., & Olivier, P. Engaging older people using participatory design. In Proc. CHI 2012, ACM Press (2012), 1199--1208.

Digital Library

[15]

Massimi, M., Baecker, R., & Wu, M. Using participatory activities with seniors to critique, build, and evaluate mobile phones In Proc. ASSETS 2007 (2007), 155--162.

Digital Library

[16]

McLaughlin, A. C., Rogers, W. A., & Fisk, A. D. (2009). Using direct and indirect input devices: Attention demands and age-related differences. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction 16, 1 (2009), 2.

Digital Library

[17]

Pedell, S., Vetere, F. Kulik, L, Ozanne, E., and Gruner, A. Social isolation of older people: the role of domestic technologies. In Proc. OZCHI 2010. Brisbane, Australia, ACM Press (2010), 167--170.

Digital Library

[18]

Stößel, C., Wandke, H., & Blessing, L. Gestural Interfaces for Elderly Users: Help or Hindrance? In Gesture in Embodied Communication and Human-Computer Interaction (2010), 269--280.

Digital Library

[19]

Vetere, F., Davis, H., Gibbs, M., & Howard, S. The Magic Box and Collage: Responding to the challenge of distributed intergenerational play. In International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 67, 2 (2009), 165--178.

Digital Library

[20]

Vines, J., Blythe, M., Lindsay, S., Dunphy, P., Monk, A., & Olivier, P. Questionable concepts: Critique as a resource for designing with eighty somethings. In Proc. CHI 2012, ACM Press (2012), 1169--1178.

Digital Library

Cited By

Shinde PMartin-Hammond A(2024)Designing to Support Blind and Visually Impaired Older Adults in Managing the Invisible Labor of Social Participation: Opportunities and ChallengesProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642203(1-14)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3613904.3642203
Hsu LStafford PKhoo WSwaminathan MAmon KSato HTsui KCrandall DSabanović SGrollman DBroadbent EJu WSoh HWilliams T(2024)"Give it Time:" Longitudinal Panels Scaffold Older Adults' Learning and Robot Co-DesignProceedings of the 2024 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction10.1145/3610977.3634979(283-292)Online publication date: 11-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3610977.3634979
Flynn ABarry MQi Koh WReilly GBrennan ARedfern SCasey D(2022)Introducing and Familiarising Older Adults Living with Dementia and Their Caregivers to Virtual RealityInternational Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health10.3390/ijerph19231634319:23(16343)Online publication date: 6-Dec-2022
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192316343
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

Actively engaging older adults in the development and evaluation of tablet technology
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Human computer interaction (HCI)
    1. HCI theory, concepts and models
  2. Interaction design
    1. Interaction design process and methods
      1. User centered design
    2. Interaction design theory, concepts and paradigms

Recommendations

Teaching Tablet Technology to Older Adults
HCI International 2021 - Late Breaking Papers: Cognition, Inclusion, Learning, and Culture
Abstract
Tablets can open a new world for older adults and potentially improve their quality of life. We taught tablet skills to forty-two older adults, who were novice technology users. Sixteen socialized, group-based technology workshops were conducted ...
Engaging Older Adults with Modern Technology: Internet Use and Information Access Needs
Recruiting Older Adults in the Wild: Reflections on Challenges and Lessons Learned from Research Experience
PervasiveHealth '18: Proceedings of the 12th EAI International Conference on Pervasive Computing Technologies for Healthcare

It is important to understand the older adults prior to the design process. The understanding can better facilitate design conversations between the researchers and the older adults. In this paper, we discussed our experiences of building a relationship ...

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Other conferences

OzCHI '12: Proceedings of the 24th Australian Computer-Human Interaction Conference

November 2012

692 pages

ISBN:9781450314381

DOI:10.1145/2414536

Copyright © 2012 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

Sponsors

New Zealand Chapter of ACM SIGCHI
Human Factors & Ergonomics Soc: Human Factors & Ergonomics Soc

In-Cooperation

SIGCHI: ACM Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 26 November 2012

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Request Permissions

Check for updates

Author Tags

Qualifiers

Research-article

Conference

OzCHI '12

Sponsor:

Human Factors & Ergonomics Soc

OzCHI '12: The 24th Australian Computer-Human Interaction Conference

November 26 - 30, 2012

Melbourne, Australia

Acceptance Rates

Overall Acceptance Rate 362 of 729 submissions, 50%

Contributors

Other Metrics

View Article Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

43
Total Citations
View Citations
689
Total Downloads

Downloads (Last 12 months)29
Downloads (Last 6 weeks)3

Reflects downloads up to 22 Sep 2024

Other Metrics

View Author Metrics

Citations

Cited By

Shinde PMartin-Hammond A(2024)Designing to Support Blind and Visually Impaired Older Adults in Managing the Invisible Labor of Social Participation: Opportunities and ChallengesProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642203(1-14)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3613904.3642203
Hsu LStafford PKhoo WSwaminathan MAmon KSato HTsui KCrandall DSabanović SGrollman DBroadbent EJu WSoh HWilliams T(2024)"Give it Time:" Longitudinal Panels Scaffold Older Adults' Learning and Robot Co-DesignProceedings of the 2024 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction10.1145/3610977.3634979(283-292)Online publication date: 11-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3610977.3634979
Flynn ABarry MQi Koh WReilly GBrennan ARedfern SCasey D(2022)Introducing and Familiarising Older Adults Living with Dementia and Their Caregivers to Virtual RealityInternational Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health10.3390/ijerph19231634319:23(16343)Online publication date: 6-Dec-2022
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192316343
Provencher VBaillargeon DAbdulrazak BBoissy PLevasseur MDelli-Colli NPigot HAudet MBahrampoor Givi SGirard C(2022)Developing a One-Stop Platform Transportation Planning Service to Help Older Adults Move Around in Their Community Where, When, and How They Wish: Protocol for a Living Lab StudyJMIR Research Protocols10.2196/3389411:6(e33894)Online publication date: 9-Jun-2022
https://doi.org/10.2196/33894
An LMuñoz DPedell SSterling L(2022)Understanding Confidence of Older Adults for Embracing Mobile TechnologiesProceedings of the 34th Australian Conference on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/3572921.3576202(38-50)Online publication date: 29-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3572921.3576202
Cajamarca GHerskovic VLucero AAldunate A(2022)A Co-Design Approach to Explore Health Data Representation for Older Adults in Chile and EcuadorProceedings of the 2022 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference10.1145/3532106.3533558(1802-1817)Online publication date: 13-Jun-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3532106.3533558
Cerna KMüller CRandall DHunker M(2022)Situated Scaffolding for Sustainable Participatory DesignProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/34928316:GROUP(1-25)Online publication date: 14-Jan-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3492831
de Weck ODe Weck O(2022)Aging and TechnologyTechnology Roadmapping and Development10.1007/978-3-030-88346-1_21(587-604)Online publication date: 22-Jun-2022
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-88346-1_21
Barbosa Neves BWaycott JMaddox A(2021)When Technologies are Not Enough: The Challenges of Digital Interventions to Address Loneliness in Later LifeSociological Research Online10.1177/1360780421102929828:1(150-170)Online publication date: 24-Aug-2021
https://doi.org/10.1177/13607804211029298
Sin JL. Franz RMunteanu CBarbosa Neves BKitamura YQuigley AIsbister KIgarashi TBjørn PDrucker S(2021)Digital Design Marginalization: New Perspectives on Designing Inclusive InterfacesProceedings of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3411764.3445180(1-11)Online publication date: 6-May-2021
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3411764.3445180
Show More Cited By

View Options

Get Access

Login options

Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

Full Access

Get this Publication

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

eReader

View online with eReader.

Media

Figures

Other

Tables

View Table of Contents