Many older adults find that they must manage one or more chronic illnesses entailing multiple medication regimens. These regimens can be daunting, with consequences for medication adherence and health outcomes. To promote adherence to medication regimens, we used contextual design to develop paper and digital prototypes of a medication management device. The design focused on enhancing users’ motivation to adhere to medication therapy. Our design process and outcome suggest that contextual design might serve as an effective data-driven method that can account for the less tangible aspects of work activities, such as motivation.
Emerging wearable and mobile communication technologies, such as lightweight head-mounted displays (HMDs) and handheld devices, promise support for everyday remote collaboration. Despite their potential for widespread use, their effectiveness as collaborative tools is unknown, particularly in physical tasks involving mobility. To better understand their impact on collaborative behaviors, perceptions, and performance, we conducted a two-by-two (technology type: HMD vs. tablet computer; task setting: static vs. dynamic) between-subjects study where participants (n = 66) remotely collaborated as "helper" and "worker" pairs in the construction of a physical object. Our results showed that, in the dynamic task, HMD use enabled helpers to offer more frequent directing commands and more proactive assistance, resulting in marginally faster task completion. In the static task, while tablet use helped convey subtle visual information, helpers and workers had conflicting perceptions of how the two technologies contributed to their success. Our findings offer strong design and research implications, underlining the importance of a consistent view of the shared workspace and the differential support collaborators with different roles receive from technologies.
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