Challenges in Developing Applications for Aging Populations

Elderly individuals can greatly benefit from the use of computer applications, which can assist in monitoring health conditions, staying in contact with friends and family, and even learning new things. However, developing accessible applications for an elderly user can be a daunting task for developers. Since the advent of the personal computer, the benefits and challenges of developing applications for older adults have been a hot topic of discussion. In this chapter, the authors discuss the various challenges developers who wish to create applications for the elderly computer user face, including age-related impairments, generational differences in computer use, and the hardware constraints mobile devices pose for application developers. Although these challenges are concerning, each can be overcome after being properly identified

ANGELAH: A Framework for Assisting Elders At Home

The ever growing percentage of elderly people within modern societies poses welfare systems under relevant stress. In fact, partial and progressive loss of motor, sensorial, and/or cognitive skills renders elders unable to live autonomously, eventually leading to their hospitalization. This results in both relevant emotional and economic costs. Ubiquitous computing technologies can offer interesting opportunities for in-house safety and autonomy. However, existing systems partially address in-house safety requirements and typically focus on only elder monitoring and emergency detection. The paper presents ANGELAH, a middleware-level solution integrating both ”elder monitoring and emergency detection” solutions and networking solutions. ANGELAH has two main features: i) it enables efficient integration between a variety of sensors and actuators deployed at home for emergency detection and ii) provides a solid framework for creating and managing rescue teams composed of individuals willing to promptly assist elders in case of emergency situations. A prototype of ANGELAH, designed for a case study for helping elders with vision impairments, is developed and interesting results are obtained from both computer simulations and a real-network testbed

Artificial Intelligence-based Smarter Accessibility Evaluations for Comprehensive and Personalized Assessment

The research focuses on utilizing artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) algorithms to enhance accessibility for people with disabilities (PwD) in three areas: public buildings, homes, and medical devices. The overarching goal is to improve the accuracy, reliability, and effectiveness of accessibility evaluation systems by leveraging smarter technologies. For public buildings, the challenge lies in developing an accurate and reliable accessibility evaluation system. AI can play a crucial role by analyzing data, identifying potential barriers, and assessing the accessibility of various features within buildings. By training ML algorithms on relevant data, the system can learn to make accurate predictions about the accessibility of different spaces and help policymakers and architects design more inclusive environments. For private places such as homes, it is essential to have a person-focused accessibility evaluation system. By utilizing machine learning-based intelligent systems, it becomes possible to assess the accessibility of individual homes based on specific needs and requirements. This personalized approach can help identify barriers and recommend modifications or assistive technologies that can enhance accessibility and independence for PwD within their own living spaces. The research also addresses the intelligent evaluation of healthcare devices in the home. Many PwD rely on medical devices for their daily living, and ensuring the accessibility and usability of these devices is crucial. AI can be employed to evaluate the accessibility features of medical devices, provide recommendations for improvement, and even measure their effectiveness in supporting the needs of PwD. Overall, this research aims to enhance the accuracy and reliability of accessibility evaluation systems by leveraging AI and ML technologies. By doing so, it seeks to improve the quality of life for individuals with disabilities by enabling increased independence, fostering social inclusion, and promoting better accessibility in public buildings, private homes, and medical devices

An Advanced Home ElderCare Service

With the increase of welfare cost all over the developed world, there is a need to resort to new technologies that could help reduce this enormous cost and provide some quality eldercare services. This paper presents a middleware-level solution that integrates monitoring and emergency detection solutions with networking solutions. The proposed system enables efficient integration between a variety of sensors and actuators deployed at home for emergency detection and provides a framework for creating and managing rescue teams willing to assist elders in case of emergency situations. A prototype of the proposed system was designed and implemented. Results were obtained from both computer simulations and a real-network testbed. These results show that the proposed system can help overcome some of the current problems and help reduce the enormous cost of eldercare service

Accessible and inclusive cyber security:a nuanced and complex challenge

It has been argued that human-centred security design needs to accommodate the considerations of three dimensions: (1) security, (2) usability and (3) accessibility. The latter has not yet received much attention. Now that governments and health services are increasingly requiring their citizens/patients to use online services, the need for accessible security and privacy has become far more pressing. The reality is that, for many, security measures are often exasperatingly inaccessible. Regardless of the outcome of the debate about the social acceptability of compelling people to access public services online, we still need to design accessibility into these systems, or risk excluding and marginalising swathes of the population who cannot use these systems in the same way as abled users. These users are particularly vulnerable to attack and online deception not only because security and privacy controls are inaccessible but also because they often struggle with depleted resources and capabilities together with less social, economic and political resilience. This conceptual paper contemplates the accessible dimension of human-centred security and its impact on the inclusivity of security technologies. We scope the range of vulnerabilities that can result from a lack of accessibility in security solutions and contemplate the nuances and complex challenges inherent in making security accessible. We conclude by suggesting a number of avenues for future work in this space.</p

Ethical Issues in the New Digital Era: The Case of Assisting Driving

Mobility is associated with driving a vehicle. Age-related declines in the abilities of older persons present certain obstacles to safe driving. The negative effects of driving cessation on older adults’ physical, mental, cognitive, and social functioning are well reported. Automated driving solutions represent a potential solution to promoting driver persistence and the management of fitness to drive issues in older adults. Technology innovation influences societal values and raises ethical questions. The advancement of new driving solutions raises overarching questions in relation to the values of society and how we design technology (a) to promote positive values around ageing, (b) to enhance ageing experience, (c) to protect human rights, (d) to ensure human benefit and (e) to prioritise human well-being. To this end, this chapter reviews the relevant ethical considerations in relation to assisted driving solutions. Further, it presents a new ethically aligned system concept for assisted driving. It is argued that human benefit, well-being and respect for human identity and rights are important goals for new automated driving technologies. Enabling driver persistence is an issue for all of society and not just older adult

Assessing the value of the information provision for enhancing the autonomy of mobility impaired users. Madrid pilot Site Study.

A City is the space where every person acquires the citizen condition, which demands access to multiple services and facilities, and develops social relations in a free and equal condition of options. A lack of accessibility limits independency and autonomy. Thus, the relationship between “sustainable development” and “accessibility for all” becomes clearer, and both goals reinforce each other. In this sense, information plays a key role in order to overcome existing barriers, specially for people who rarely use public transport, have impaired mobility, or make a particular journey for the first time. The impact and benefits is linked with public transport as a “facilitator” of mobility, and, in particular, for the aim of intermodality. The usefulness of information that should be provided (both the information itself and how is offered) to mobility impaired users (MI users) is discussed on this paper based on following of the ASK-IT project that has being carry out on Madrid. The work was done in close cooperation with representatives of all different types of MI user groups