a mobile application for easy design and testing of algorithms to monitor physical activity in the workplace

This paper addresses approaches to Human Activity Recognition (HAR) with the aim of monitoring the physical activity of people in the workplace, by means of a smartphone application exploiting the available on-board accelerometer sensor. In fact, HAR via a smartphone or wearable sensor can provide important information regarding the level of daily physical activity, especially in situations where a sedentary behavior usually occurs, like in modern workplace environments. Increased sitting time is significantly associated with severe health diseases, and the workplace is an appropriate intervention setting, due to the sedentary behavior typical of modern jobs. Within this paper, the state-of-the-art components of HAR are analyzed, in order to identify and select the most effective signal filtering and windowing solutions for physical activity monitoring. The classifier development process is based upon three phases; a feature extraction phase, a feature selection phase, and a training phase. In the training phase, a publicly available dataset is used to test among different classifier types and learning methods. A user-friendly Android-based smartphone application with low computational requirements has been developed to run field tests, which allows to easily change the classifier under test, and to collect new datasets ready for use with machine learning APIs. The newly created datasets may include additional information, like the smartphone position, its orientation, and the user's physical characteristics. Using the mobile tool, a classifier based on a decision tree is finally set up and enriched with the introduction of some robustness improvements. The developed approach is capable of classifying six activities, and to distinguish between not active (sitting) and active states, with an accuracy near to 99%. The mobile tool, which is going to be further extended and enriched, will allow for rapid and easy benchmarking of new algorithms based on previously generated data, and on future collected datasets

Smart workplaces: a system proposal for stress management

Over the past last decades of contemporary society, workplaces have become the primary source of many health issues, leading to mental problems such as stress, depression, and anxiety. Among the others, environmental aspects have shown to be the causes of stress, illness, and lack of productivity. With the arrival of new technologies, especially in the smart workplaces field, most studies have focused on investigating the building energy efficiency models and human thermal comfort. However, little has been applied to occupants’ stress recognition and well-being overall. Due to this fact, this present study aims to propose a stress management solution for an interactive design system that allows the adapting of comfortable environmental conditions according to the user preferences by measuring in real-time the environmental and biological characteristics, thereby helping to prevent stress, as well as to enable users to cope stress when being stressed. The secondary objective will focus on evaluating one part of the system: the mobile application. The proposed system uses several usability methods to identify users’ needs, behavior, and expectations from the user-centered design approach. Applied methods, such as User Research, Card Sorting, and Expert Review, allowed us to evaluate the design system according to Heuristics Analysis, resulting in improved usability of interfaces and experience. The study presents the research results, the design interface, and usability tests. According to the User Research results, temperature and noise are the most common environmental stressors among the users causing stress and uncomfortable conditions to work in, and the preference for physical activities over the digital solutions for coping with stress. Additionally, the System Usability Scale (SUS) results identified that the system’s usability was measured as “excellent” and “acceptable” with a final score of 88 points out of the 100. It is expected that these conclusions can contribute to future investigations in the smart workplaces study field and their interaction with the people placed there.Nas últimas décadas da sociedade contemporânea, o local de trabalho tem se tornado principal fonte de muitos problemas de saúde mental, como o stress, depressão e ansiedade. Os aspetos ambientais têm se revelado como as causas de stress, doenças, falta de produtividade, entre outros. Atualmente, com a chegada de novas tecnologias, principalmente na área de locais de trabalho inteligentes, a maioria dos estudos tem se concentrado na investigação de modelos de eficiência energética de edifícios e conforto térmico humano. No entanto, pouco foi aplicado ao reconhecimento do stress dos ocupantes e ao bem-estar geral das pessoas. Diante disso, o objetivo principal é propor um sistema de design de gestão do stress para um sistema de design interativo que permita adaptar as condições ambientais de acordo com as preferências de utilizador, medindo em tempo real as características ambientais e biológicas, auxiliando assim na prevenção de stress, bem como ajuda os utilizadores a lidar com o stress quando estão sob o mesmo. O segundo objetivo é desenhar e avaliar uma parte do projeto — o protótipo da aplicação móvel através da realização de testes de usabilidade. O sistema proposto resulta da abordagem de design centrado no utilizador, utilizando diversos métodos de usabilidade para identificar as necessidades, comportamentos e as expectativas dos utilizadores. Métodos aplicados, como Pesquisa de Usuário, Card Sorting e Revisão de Especialistas, permitiram avaliar o sistema de design de acordo com a análise heurística, resultando numa melhoria na usabilidade das interfaces e experiência. O estudo apresenta os resultados da pesquisa, a interface do design e os testes de usabilidade. De acordo com os resultados de User Research, a temperatura e o ruído são os stressores ambientais mais comuns entre os utilizadores, causando stresse e condições menos favoráveis para trabalhar, igualmente existe uma preferência por atividades físicas sobre as soluções digitais na gestão do stresse. Adicionalmente, os resultados de System Usability Scale (SUS) identificaram a usabilidade do sistema de design como “excelente” e “aceitável” com pontuação final de 88 pontos em 100. É esperado que essas conclusões possam contribuir para futuras investigações no campo de estudo dos smart workplaces e sua interação com os utilizadores

Wearable Computing for Health and Fitness: Exploring the Relationship between Data and Human Behaviour

Health and fitness wearable technology has recently advanced, making it easier for an individual to monitor their behaviours. Previously self generated data interacts with the user to motivate positive behaviour change, but issues arise when relating this to long term mention of wearable devices. Previous studies within this area are discussed. We also consider a new approach where data is used to support instead of motivate, through monitoring and logging to encourage reflection. Based on issues highlighted, we then make recommendations on the direction in which future work could be most beneficial

A Smart Glucose Monitoring System for Diabetic Patient

[EN] Diabetic patients need ongoing surveillance, but this involves high costs for the government and family. The combined use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), artificial intelligence and smart devices can reduce these costs, helping the diabetic patient. This paper presents an intelligent architecture for the surveillance of diabetic disease that will allow physicians to remotely monitor the health of their patients through sensors integrated into smartphones and smart portable devices. The proposed architecture includes an intelligent algorithm developed to intelligently detect whether a parameter has exceeded a threshold, which may or may not involve urgency. To verify the proper functioning of this system, we developed a small portable device capable of measuring the level of glucose in the blood for diabetics and body temperature. We designed a secure mechanism to establish a wireless connection with the smartphone.Rghioui, A.; Lloret, J.; Harane, M.; Oumnad, A. (2020). A Smart Glucose Monitoring System for Diabetic Patient. Electronics. 9(4):1-18. https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics9040678S1189

Machine learning and ontology in eCoaching for personalized activity level monitoring and recommendation generation

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Intelligent Mobile Learning Interaction System (IMLIS): A Personalized Learning System for People with Mental Disabilities

The domain of learning context for people with special needs is a big challenge for digi- tal media in education. This thesis describes the main ideas and the architecture of a system called Intelligent Mobile Learning Interaction System (IMLIS) that provides a mobile learning environment for people with mental disabilities. The design of IMLIS aims to enhance personalization aspects by using a decision engine, which makes deci- sions based on the user s abilities, learning history and reactions to processes. It allows for adaptation, adjustment and personalization of content, learning activities, and the user interface on different levels in a context where learners and teachers are targeting autonomous learning by personalized lessons and feedback. Due to IMLIS dynamic structure and flexible patterns, it is able to meet the specific needs of individuals and to engage them in learning activities with new learning motivations. In addition to support- ing learning material and educational aspects, mobile learning fosters learning across context and provides more social communication and collaboration for its users. The suggested methodology defines a comprehensive learning process for the mentally disabled to support them in formal and informal learning. We apply knowledge from the field of research and practice to people with mental disabilities, as well as discuss the pedagogical and didactical aspects of the design