Technology to Support Aging in Place: Older Adults’ Perspectives

Abstract

The U.S. population over 65 years of age is increasing. Most older adults prefer to age in place, and technologies, including Internet of things (IoT), Ambient/Active Assisted Living (AAL) robots and other artificial intelligence (AI), can support independent living. However, a top-down design process creates mismatches between technologies and older adults’ needs. A user-centered design approach was used to identify older adults’ perspectives regarding AAL and AI technologies and gauge interest in participating in a co-design process. A survey was used to obtain demographic characteristics and assess privacy perspectives. A convenience sample of 31 retirement community residents participated in one of two 90-min focus group sessions. The semi-structured group interview solicited barriers and facilitators to technology adoption, privacy attitudes, and interest in project co-design participation to inform technology development. Focus group sessions were audiotaped and professionally transcribed. Transcripts were reviewed and coded to identify themes and patterns. Descriptive statistics were applied to the quantitative data. Identified barriers to technology use included low technology literacy, including lack of familiarity with terminology, and physical challenges, which can make adoption difficult. Facilitators included an eagerness to learn, interest in co-design, and a desire to understand and control their data. Most participants identified as privacy pragmatics and fundamentalists, indicating that privacy is important to older adults. At the same time, they also reported a willingness to contribute to the design of technologies that would facilitate aging independently. There is a need to increase technology literacy of older adults along with aging literacy of technologists.

Using Mobile Health and the Impact on Health-Related Quality of Life: Perceptions of Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment

“…The results generated from this study were based on patterns recognized empirically both in this study and in related research [44] that focused on technology to support aging in place. According to Larsson [45], transferability of qualitative research results can be seen from several perspectives, including a generalization through recognition of patterns.…”

Jessie

“…They imagined the robot could monitor daily patterns to establish baselines and identify abnormal behavior, as well as to produce compliance reports about treatment adherence. While this may have clinical benefits, it raises privacy concerns, particularly for people whose MCI is more advanced or who may have lower levels of technological literacy, which impacts informed consent [42,66,78,91,93]. This requires thoughtful consideration and additional research to identify how to best balance these potentially conflicting constraints both with JESSIE and more broadly.…”

Healthy ageing in the far North: perspectives and prescriptions

“…For instance, conceptual models that attempt to define proper ageing fail to address, in any meaningful sense, how healthy ageing is impacted by one's physical location and context, particularly when circumstances that may be considered "outside of the norm" ensue, such as living in a remote area. Ageing-in-place has been receiving increased attention in the literature in recent years [15][16][17][18]. Additionally, the question of how ageing is approached, whether the word "successful" or "healthy" is most appropriate, whether the difference is relevant, and how those words are defined has yet to be resolved.…”