Adoption of Mobile Communication Technology: An Empirical Study on Females Working in Elderly Care

The Finnish municipal open care service in Turku applied mobile communication technology in order to cut costs and increase the efficiency of its elderly care. The home help staff was given a number of Nokia Communicators for the purpose of ordering groceries for their elderly and disabled customers. In this paper we present and discuss our empirical findings of the adoption of mobile communication technology by an all-female population. The results contradict some assumptions generally made in literature about the impact of age and experience on technology adoption

Experiences of People with Visual Impairments in Accessing Online Information and Services: A Systematic Literature Review

The World Wide Web is the largest source of electronic information in the world. Over the years, rapid advances in the internet have made it less accessible thereby making it increasingly difficult for people with visual impairments to access online information and services. This paper systematically reviews previous research to identify challenges that people with visual impairments face, and the role of accessibility technologies and guidelines to support people with visual impairments in their access to online information and services. The findings discuss three categories emerged from the literature: inaccessible content for the visually impaired, improving website accessibility for the visually impaired, and accessibility technologies and their benefits and limitations for people with visual impairments. The findings further discuss the usability issues which are present in accessing online content, the different attempts that have been made to mitigate these problems, and the different guidelines and tools that can be adopted by web designers to make websites more accessible for the visually impaired. It also discusses the versatility and availability of various accessibility technologies. Although these technologies provide basic access to online information, they are greatly limited in their functionality. Therefore, it is up to the web designers to change their perceptions when designing websites. With the proper use of the guidelines, the capabilities of accessibility technologies can be accommodated in making information provided accessible to all users including those with visual impairments. The contributions of this research are that it offers a rigorous narrative review to summarise the state of knowledge on challenges that people with visual impairments face in accessing online information and services, the support and limitations of accessibility technologies in addressing some of these challenges. In addition, this study identifies gaps and areas that deserve more scrutiny in future research including digital exclusion issues among the visually impaired, explanation on the unwillingness of web designers to develop accessible websites, improvements to accessibility technologies to support increasingly visually complex websites, among others. Since the visually impaired are a diverse group with different degrees of impairments, needs and preferences, we encourage researchers to involve them in future studies. Available at: https://aisel.aisnet.org/pajais/vol11/iss2/3

Consideration on the Improvement of Assistive Products\u27 Availability and the Awareness of Rehabilitation Professionals in Bangladesh

博士（医療リハビリテーション学）神戸学院大学2019年

Mobile Communication for Older People: New Opportunities for Autonomous Life

The fast diffusion of mobile telephony is opening a vast diversity of new opportunities for older people with different levels of physical restrictions due to ageing. Mobile technology not only allows ubiquitous communications but also anytime access to some services that are vital for their security and autonomy. Together with the numerous advantages, remote services can also mean important social and ethical risks for this group of users making indispensable that these risks are detected, analysed and avoided. Therefore, this paper analyses the novelties that mobile technology has introduced into the lives of older users, points out some dangers and challenges arising from the use of these technologies and revises some future applications of the present mobile technologies

Culture and disaster risk management – citizens’ reactions and opinions during Citizen Summit in Malta

The analyses and results in this document are based on data collected during the second CARISMAND Citizen Summit held in Malta on July 16th 2016. The Citizen Summit was designed as a 1-day event combining public information with feedback gathering through different methods of data collection: (1) 30 questions with pre-defined answer options posed to the audience and collected via an audience response system; and (2) small moderated group discussions of approximately 1.5 hours duration which followed a detailed set of questions and discussion guidelines, including (3) a short association exercise. All questions and discussions aimed to explore citizens’ attitudes, feelings and perceptions towards disaster risks as well as the identification of cultural factors in disaster preparation, response and recovery. The definition and design of the questions was based on a literature review, preliminary research results from other work packages, and taking up specific topics identified in the 1st CARISMAND Stakeholder Assembly. For a detailed overview of all questions asked and topics discussed please see Appendix A. Overall, 108 citizens participated in the Malta event. The total sample shows a relatively even gender and age distribution, which is unsurprising given the target quotas which were requested from the recruiting local market research agency. The comparatively low number of senior citizens aged 65 and above was expected and reflects mobility issues.Participants were asked about three key aspects of experience of disasters and disaster risk perception that could potentially have an impact on how other questions were answered. Half of respondents indicated that they, or a close friend or family member, have experienced a disaster, 38% felt that they are living in an area that is specifically prone to disasters, and 48% answered that they know other people in the area where they live who they think are particularly vulnerable or exposed to disasters. Slight gender differences were found to be not statistically significant (p>=.05). This report presents the results of the second CARISMAND Citizen Summit and is structured in six main sections: After this introduction, the second section will provide an overview of the different methods applied. The third section, based on the quantitative data collected via the audience response system, presents the results from questions on general disaster risk perceptions, disaster preparedness, and behaviours in disaster situations, the latter with a particular focus on the use of social media. The fourth section, based on the qualitative data collected in the discussion groups, will analyse the participants’ risk perceptions and behaviours related to (a) different “features” of disasters, in particular related to slow/fast onset, short/long-term effects and the “visibility” of disasters, and (b) different disaster phases. Furthermore, this section will report on the different cultural aspects and cultural groups identified by the participants, the specific needs of such groups, and perceived community strengths and weaknesses in case of a disaster. Additionally, it will provide insight into participants’ views on measures that may help to improve disaster preparedness and response. The fifth section focuses on risk perception in relation to causes of disasters, in particular the blurred distinction between natural and man-made disasters. The final section compares and contrasts the results from sections 2, 3 and 4, draws some tentative conclusions, and identifies topics and issues that should feed into the next round of events in 2017, i.e. the 2nd Stakeholder Assembly as well as the 3rd and 4th Citizen Summits.The project was co-funded by the European Commission within the Horizon2020 Programme (2014-2020).peer-reviewe

Manipulative Use of Short Messaging Service (SMS) Text Messages by Nigerian Telecommunications Companies

This paper is an application of Relevance Theory for the interpretation of short messaging service (SMS) text messages emanating from Nigerian telecommunications companies to their subscribers. The aim of the research was to identify and describe the manipulative strategies employed by Nigerian telecommunications companies to induce subscribers to part with their money through sales promotion lotteries. 100 SMS texts were purposively extracted from the cell phones of randomly selected residents of Lagos Nigeria who had received promotional SMS text messages from three major Nigerian telecommunications companies. Using Sperber and Wilson's Relevance Theory (1995) as its theoretical framework, the paper described the manipulative use of SMS by Nigerian telecommunications companies. The analysis revealed that SMS text messages were encoded to achieve maximization of relevance through explicature and implicature; contextual implication and strengthening; and the reduction of processing effort through violating the maxim of truthfulness and the creative use of graphology. The paper concludes that SMS text-messages were used manipulatively by Nigerian telecommunications companies to earn indirect income from sales promotion lottery