ATHENE : Assistive technologies for healthy living in elders : needs assessment by ethnography

Numerous assistive technologies to support independent living –including personal alarms, mobile phones, self-monitoring devices, mobility aids, software apps and home adaptations –have been developed over the years, but their uptake by older people, especially those from minority ethnic groups, is poor. This paper outlines the ways in which the ATHENE project seeks to redress this situation by producing a richer understanding of the complex and diverse living experiences and care needs of older people and exploring how industry, the NHS, social services and third sector can work with the older people themselves to ‘co-produce’ useful and useable ALT designs to meet their needs. In this paper, we provide an overview of the project methodology and discuss some of the issues it raises for the design and development process

Technology inspired design for pervasive healthcare

Pervasive healthcare technologies are increasingly using novel sensory devices that are able to measure phenomena that could not be measured before. To develop novel healthcare applications that use these largely untested technologies, it is important to have a design process that allows proper exploration of the capabilities of the novel technologies. We focus on the technology-inspired design process that was used in the development of a system to support posture and provide guidance by nudging people, and how this has lead us to explore pervasive healthcare applications

Using affective avatars and rich multimedia content for education of children with autism

Autism is a communication disorder that mandates early and continuous educational interventions on various levels like the everyday social, communication and reasoning skills. Computer-aided education has recently been considered as a likely intervention method for such cases, and therefore different systems have been proposed and developed worldwide. In more recent years, affective computing applications for the aforementioned interventions have also been proposed to shed light on this problem. In this paper, we examine the technological and educational needs of affective interventions for autistic persons. Enabling affective technologies are visited and a number of possible exploitation scenarios are illustrated. Emphasis is placed in covering the continuous and long term needs of autistic persons by unobtrusive and ubiquitous technologies with the engagement of an affective speaking avatar. A personalised prototype system facilitating these scenarios is described. In addition the feedback from educators for autistic persons is provided for the system in terms of its usefulness, efficiency and the envisaged reaction of the autistic persons, collected by means of an anonymous questionnaire. Results illustrate the clear potential of this effort in facilitating a very promising autism intervention

Getting it Right: Lessons Learned in Applying a Critical Artefact Approach

“Critical artefacts”, the products of critical design (Dunne 1999), prompt reflection rather than satisfy obvious user needs. The author is developing an instrumental use of critical artefacts as part of a human-centred design process. Earlier work showed the effectiveness of this approach in allowing stakeholders to engage with novel product ideas. This paper describes a project, Living Rooms, developing the approach with a broader group of stakeholders and devising the critical artefacts with other designers. Although providing insights into the design context (Bowen & Chamberlain 2008), this application of the approach was less productive than in earlier projects and suggested factors that could affect its efficacy. Implications for future applications of the approach are noted: the type of contexts it is appropriate for; the characteristics of effective stakeholder participants and the need to educate them in the context and enable them to think imaginatively. Von Hippel’s ‘lead users’ (1986, 1988) could provide a framework for selecting stakeholders likely to engage effectively with critical artefacts. The second part of the paper summarises lead user theory and discusses how the two characteristics of lead users, motivation and capability (Luthje & Herstatt 2004), tend to make them suitable participants for the critical artefact approach. A second project, Digital Mementos, is described – in particular how lead-user-based selection and the above implications have been applied. The paper concludes by reviewing the progress in developing generalisable methods exploiting the critical artefact approach, noting the need to position the approach within wider design activity and points toward future work relating it to the entire product design process. Keywords: Critical Design; Human-Centred Design; Innovation; Design Methodology</p

Inclusive Design of 'Away from Home' Toilets

This book chapter was the culmination of Bichard’s work for the EPSRC-funded VivaCity2020 research consortium (http://www.vivacity2020.co.uk, 2003-2008). The edited book focused on design for sustainability of the 24-hour city from the multidisciplinary perspective of the VivaCity2020 project (physical and social sciences, engineering and design). Considering key issues of sustainability and quality of life, it highlights innovative decision- making in urban planning and environmental design. Bichard and Hanson’s (UCL) chapter presents inclusive design research undertaken by Bichard for the project on sustainable city toilet provision, and includes a design guidance review and results from an audit tool applied to 101 cubicles around England. The audit found that no cubicle had fully followed design recommendations. Interviews with 250 people identified challenges to toilet access within the city and informed the design of 42 ‘personas’ as ‘decision-making tools’ for architects, designers and planners. Design templates for the layout of cubicles for a range of abilities, including the need for an adult changing bench, were also presented. Bichard’s work on the VivaCity2020 project also included a design guide, The Accessible Toilet Resource (1147 Downloads from 18 countries), a further book chapter, ‘Designing accessible technology’, four journal articles (for Senses & Society and Access by Design, the journal of the Centre of Accessible Environments), six conference papers, two conference posters and two book reviews (for Social & Cultural Geography and Gender, Place & Culture). Bichard received funding for further work as co-investigator on Tackling Ageing Continence through Theory, Tools & Technology (TACT3) funded by the cross-Council ‘New Dynamics of Ageing Programme’ (£1.3m, 2008–12), and as principal investigator of Robust Accessible Toilets (RATs), funded by the cross-Research Council Connected Communities Programme (£12,000, 2011). In addition, she was guest editor of a special issue of The Design Journal on inclusive design (2013)

Japan's silver market: creating a new industry under uncertainty

It has often been asked whether today´s Japan will be able to move into new and promising industries, or whether it is locked into an innovation system with an inherent inability to give birth to new industries. One argument reasons that the thick institutional complementarities among labour, innovation, and finance among its enterprises and the public sector favour industrial development in sectors of intermediate uncertainty, while it is difficult to move into areas of major uncertainty. In this paper, we present the case of the silver industry or, somewhat more prosaically, the 60+ or even 50+ industry, for which most would agree that Japan has indeed become a lead market and lead producer on the global market. For an institutional economist, the case of the silver industry is particularly interesting, because Japan´s success is based on the cooperation of existing actors, the enterprise and public sector in particular, which helped overcome the information uncertainties and asymmetries involved in the new market by relying on several established mechanisms developed well before. In that sense, Japan´s silver industry presents a case of of what we propose to call successful institutional path activation with the effect of an innovative market creation, instead of the problematic lockin effects that are usually associated with the term path dependence