The Future of Work In Cities

The latest report in our City of the Future series examines societal shifts and advancements in technology that are impacting the rapidly changing American workforce. The report outlines solutions to help city leaders plan for the fast-approaching future, while forecasting the economic viability of two distinct sectors – retail and office administration – in which a quarter of Americans are currently employed

Can the 4th Industrial Revolution be a Solution to the Challenges of Social Aging?

This paper explores whether the fourth industrial revolution - robotization automation digitalization and the Internet of Things - may mitigate the social economic and labor impacts of an aging society The increasing role of advanced technologies in economic and social life has fueled concerns about the risks of such technologies to human labor social relations and human dignity These risks seem particularly tangible in advanced societies which face a shortage of skilled labor and increasing demand for social and care services By reviewing a variety of business practices in several developed economies this research seeks to build a case in favor of the use of advanced technologies in aging societies Taking into account the scale of population aging and the limited effectiveness of social and fiscal reforms in favor of a demographic change the fourth industrial revolution appears to be a useful tool to tackle social aging Without dismissing the ethical social and other concerns related to the use of advanced technologies the research shows a wide range of successful solutions and symbiotic collaboration between humans and advanced technologies in socially aging context

Creating Age-friendly Communities

The "Creating Age-friendly Communities: Housing and Technology" publication presents contemporary, innovative, and insightful narratives, debates, and frameworks based on an international collection of papers from scholars spanning the fields of gerontology, social sciences, architecture, computer science, and gerontechnology. This extensive collection of papers aims to move the narrative and debates forward in this interdisciplinary field of age-friendly cities and communities

Future bathroom: A study of user-centred design principles affecting usability, safety and satisfaction in bathrooms for people living with disabilities

Research and development work relating to assistive technology 2010-11 (Department of Health) Presented to Parliament pursuant to Section 22 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 197

Robots in healthcare? What patients say

Ajuts: This research was funded by "la Caixa" Foundation under agreement LCF/PR/RC17/10110004.In this paper, we analyse patients' perspectives on the introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotic systems in healthcare. Based on citizens' experiences when hospitalised for COVID- 19, we explore how the opinions and concerns regarding healthcare automation could not be disas-sociated from a context of high pressure on the health system and lack of resources, and a political discourse on AI and robotics; a situation intensified by the pandemic. Thus, through the analysis of a set of interviews, a series of issues are identified that revolve around the following: the empirical effects of imagined robots, the vivid experience of citizens with the care crisis, the discomfort of the ineffective, the virtualised care assemblages, the human-based face-to-face relationships, and the automatisation of healthcare tasks. In light of these results, we show the variability in patients' perspectives on AI and robotic systems and explain it by distinguishing two interpretive repertoires that account for different views and opinions: a well-being repertoire and a responsibility repertoire. Both interpretative repertoires are relevant in order to grasp the complexity of citizens' approaches to automatisation of healthcare. Attending to both allows us to move beyond the dominant (politi-cal) discourse of technology markets as the only way to respond to healthcare challenges. Thus, we can analyse and integrate patients' perspectives to develop AI and robotic systems in healthcare to serve citizens' needs and collective well-being

Personal Robot Technologies to Support Older People Living Independently

The world’s population is ageing, and the number of younger people available to care for the older population is decreasing. Digital technologies, particularly robotic technologies, are considered an important part of the solution to this looming problem. This chapter reviews some of the research over the last decade (2013 – 2023) on the development and evaluation of personal robots to assist older people living independently. The research is divided into three areas: that on older people’s needs and desires in relation to personal robots and their attitudes towards robots; their reactions to personal robots after a brief experience with them; and the evaluation of older people’s longer-term use of personal robots. Strengths and weaknesses of the research are discussed, as well as areas of need for further research.Die Weltbevölkerung altert und die Zahl der jüngeren Menschen, die für die Pflege der älteren Bevölkerung zur Verfügung stehen, nimmt ab. Digitale Technologien, insbesondere Robotertechnologien, gelten als wichtiger Teil der Lösung für dieses drohende Problem. Dieses Kapitel gibt einen Überblick über die Forschung der letzten zehn Jahre (2013 - 2023) zur Entwicklung und Bewertung von persönlichen Robotern, die ältere Menschen dabei unterstützen, ein unabhängiges Leben zu führen. Die Forschung ist in drei Bereiche unterteilt: die Bedürfnisse und Wünsche älterer Menschen in Bezug auf persönliche Roboter und ihre Einstellung zu Robotern; ihre Reaktionen auf persönliche Roboter nach kurzer Erfahrung mit ihnen; und die Bewertung der längerfristigen Nutzung persönlicher Roboter durch ältere Menschen. Stärken und Schwächen der Forschung werden diskutiert, ebenso wie Bereiche, in denen weitere Forschung notwendig ist

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

Internet of robotic things : converging sensing/actuating, hypoconnectivity, artificial intelligence and IoT Platforms

The Internet of Things (IoT) concept is evolving rapidly and influencing newdevelopments in various application domains, such as the Internet of MobileThings (IoMT), Autonomous Internet of Things (A-IoT), Autonomous Systemof Things (ASoT), Internet of Autonomous Things (IoAT), Internetof Things Clouds (IoT-C) and the Internet of Robotic Things (IoRT) etc.that are progressing/advancing by using IoT technology. The IoT influencerepresents new development and deployment challenges in different areassuch as seamless platform integration, context based cognitive network integration,new mobile sensor/actuator network paradigms, things identification(addressing, naming in IoT) and dynamic things discoverability and manyothers. The IoRT represents new convergence challenges and their need to be addressed, in one side the programmability and the communication ofmultiple heterogeneous mobile/autonomous/robotic things for cooperating,their coordination, configuration, exchange of information, security, safetyand protection. Developments in IoT heterogeneous parallel processing/communication and dynamic systems based on parallelism and concurrencyrequire new ideas for integrating the intelligent “devices”, collaborativerobots (COBOTS), into IoT applications. Dynamic maintainability, selfhealing,self-repair of resources, changing resource state, (re-) configurationand context based IoT systems for service implementation and integrationwith IoT network service composition are of paramount importance whennew “cognitive devices” are becoming active participants in IoT applications.This chapter aims to be an overview of the IoRT concept, technologies,architectures and applications and to provide a comprehensive coverage offuture challenges, developments and applications

SHELDON Smart habitat for the elderly.

An insightful document concerning active and assisted living under different perspectives: Furniture and habitat, ICT solutions and Healthcare