Smart Conversational Agents for Reminiscence

In this paper we describe the requirements and early system design for a smart conversational agent that can assist older adults in the reminiscence process. The practice of reminiscence has well documented benefits for the mental, social and emotional well-being of older adults. However, the technology support, valuable in many different ways, is still limited in terms of need of co-located human presence, data collection capabilities, and ability to support sustained engagement, thus missing key opportunities to improve care practices, facilitate social interactions, and bring the reminiscence practice closer to those with less opportunities to engage in co-located sessions with a (trained) companion. We discuss conversational agents and cognitive services as the platform for building the next generation of reminiscence applications, and introduce the concept application of a smart reminiscence agent

Eliciting Behavior From Interactive Narratives: Isolating the Role of Agency in Connecting With and Modeling Characters

A key component differentiating interactive storytelling from non-interactive media is agency, or control over character choices. A series of experiments show that providing agency over a character increased the user-character connection, which then increased engagement in a character-consistent charitable act. Findings were observed in technologically simple online narratives that controlled for navigation/controller differences, graphics, sounds, lengthy play, and avatar customization. Effects emerged even though users did not practice these acts by making their character behave charitably. Findings were robust across happy and unfortunate endings and across first-, second-, and third-person narrative perspectives. Findings suggest promise for developing inexpensive ‘‘storygames’’ to encourage supportive behaviors

Using evidence to improve Psychological Therapies Services

Psychological therapy services offer help to clients with many different sorts of mental health problems using a variety of therapies provided by a range of different professional groups and are supported by a large amount of research evidence. However, applying evidence-based practice in routine clinical settings presents particular challenges. This paper outlines some of the difficulties applying research findings to routine settings and argues for a more inclusive approach to linking evidence with practice. It describes a systematic approach to service evaluation and practice based evidence within a large psychological therapies service. This approach is integrated into the service delivery. It enables clinicians to become engaged in the process of reflecting on evidence in a non-threatening way and allows innovative ways of enhancing reflective practice by linking evidence with practice in routine settings

The Value of User-Visible Internet Cryptography

Cryptographic mechanisms are used in a wide range of applications, including email clients, web browsers, document and asset management systems, where typical users are not cryptography experts. A number of empirical studies have demonstrated that explicit, user-visible cryptographic mechanisms are not widely used by non-expert users, and as a result arguments have been made that cryptographic mechanisms need to be better hidden or embedded in end-user processes and tools. Other mechanisms, such as HTTPS, have cryptography built-in and only become visible to the user when a dialogue appears due to a (potential) problem. This paper surveys deployed and potential technologies in use, examines the social and legal context of broad classes of users, and from there, assesses the value and issues for those users

The Role of a Mobile App for Listening Comprehension Training in Distance Learning to Sustain Student Motivation

In this article the importance of listening comprehension for language students is discussed and the possible benefits of using a mobile app to motivate its practice and development are considered. The Audio News Trainer (ANT) is presented as an example of this type of app that uses the news domain as the source of audio recordings. Three research questions related to the use of this app are outlined regarding the effectiveness of the news domain for motivating the practice of listening comprehension, whether social media (such as Facebook) can increase the motivation, and how the students’ exposure to the target language can be prolonged here. An experiment is undertaken that provides data (obtained by interaction with the app and from pre- and post-questionnaires) which appear, based upon initial analyses, to support both the use of ANT to motivate the prolonged practice of listening comprehension and also the potential of social media-based interaction in second language learning nowadays

Transforming Learning Through Online Storytelling: : 'Making the News' Evaluation Report

This report presents the findings from an independent evaluation undertaken by the University of Hertfordshire of the ‘Making The News project’ as it functioned within the East of England Broadband Network region (E2BN). Making the News represents a set of simple tools that allow teachers and students to rapidly produce ‘news’ stories and publish them on line. It was developed by the Centre for New Media at the Open University in conjunction with E2BNFinal Published versio

Beyond Surveys: Analyzing Software Development Artifacts to Assess Teaching Efforts

This Innovative Practice Full Paper presents an approach of using software development artifacts to gauge student behavior and the effectiveness of changes to curriculum design. There is an ongoing need to adapt university courses to changing requirements and shifts in industry. As an educator it is therefore vital to have access to methods, with which to ascertain the effects of curriculum design changes. In this paper, we present our approach of analyzing software repositories in order to gauge student behavior during project work. We evaluate this approach in a case study of a university undergraduate software development course teaching agile development methodologies. Surveys revealed positive attitudes towards the course and the change of employed development methodology from Scrum to Kanban. However, surveys were not usable to ascertain the degree to which students had adapted their workflows and whether they had done so in accordance with course goals. Therefore, we analyzed students' software repository data, which represents information that can be collected by educators to reveal insights into learning successes and detailed student behavior. We analyze the software repositories created during the last five courses, and evaluate differences in workflows between Kanban and Scrum usage