Testing the Tangible Interactive Window with Older Adults

Abstract

Abstract. Social relationships are crucial for older adults’ well-being. Past research demonstrated that video-communication technology could reduce social isolation. However, most commercial telecommunication systems have interfaces that are too complex to be operated by older adults without assistance. In this paper, we present a system that exploits the tangible affordances of a physical window to provide a natural interface for an always-on video-communication system. In addition, we present a case study focused on the system accessibility and user acceptance with 8 older adults living in a retirement home. We also describe the preliminary findings based on an observation study and on a semistructured interview. Finally, we discuss the possible improvements and impact this system might have on older adults’ life.

Tangible User Interface for Social Interactions for the Elderly: A Review of Literature

“…Only seven papers focused on the social interaction of the elderly people. Foverskov and Binder [43] studied the possibilities for elderly people to have more active interactions and dialogues; workshop series conducted by Ehrenstrasser and Spreicer [47] in 2010 explored on the communication habits of elderly people; Meza-Kubo et al [56] studied interactions of elderly people within cognitive stimulation sessions and the factors affecting the relationships of them with their family through case study; Huldtgren et al [58] observed the interactions of the elderly participants with a tangible multimedia book and interactions between people during reminiscence sessions; Marques et al [53] conducted usability testing to observe how elderly people used tangible objects and interacted with other players while playing tabletop game; using tangible objects and tabletop surface, Murko and Kunze [62] studied the well-being of the dementia patients in terms of social interactions between caregivers and patients; and lastly, Angelini et al [63] evaluated whether elderly participants managed communicate with the person on the other side of the prototype, a tangible window. The small amount of reviewed papers focusing on social interaction of the elderly people clearly shows the lack of evidence in using TUI to make an impact on the social interactions of older adults.…”

“…There were some collaborations between technology and art, but very little with other related disciplines such as health sciences and social sciences. Only three papers [49,61,63] demonstrated multidisciplinary collaborations. Collaborations between technology and other disciplines such as health sciences and social sciences might tell us more about the benefits of using TUI to enhance social interactions of elderly people.…”

“…During the evaluations, usability aspects were studied in most of the papers, and in their evaluation, social aspects were completely neglected. Out of the 21 papers, only seven papers [43,47,53,56,58,62,63] focused on the social interaction aspect during their evaluation. Other papers like Davidoff et al [50], West et al [45], Spreicer et al [44], and Zhao et al [49] focused on usability aspects, such as ease of use, performance results in using the prototype, and feelings of independence.…”

“…By using easy, accessible technology tools, the elderly people can benefit from having a more active social life, which leads to better health too. Only three papers [49,61,63] showed collaborations with other disciplines. While most of the papers did not emphasize the relationship between technology, health, and social aspects, we would like to highlight the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration, and hopefully, more research studies can be carried out together by researchers with different yet related backgrounds.…”

Towards seamless interaction between physical and virtual locations for asymmetric collaboration

“…Close in spirit to this work is the interactive tangible window [Angelini et al 2016], which combines TTL, physical supports and telepresence. It was designed to ease the use of video-call applications for eldery adults.…”