Designing an application to support game-based learning: gathering functional requirements from a qualitative approach

This article seeks to contribute to the deepening of knowledge when designing game-based learning activities. During the design process, the specification stage is particularly relevant, being the functional requirements an important component of this process. Qualitative approaches to its gathering have gained relevance and aroused interest within the scientific community, being of most importance to describe studies that use these methodologies. This study describes the gathering of functional requirements, from a qualitative approach, to design an application for cataloging and evaluating educational games. A focus group of eight experts was set up; the functional requirements of the application were gathered according to the Communicative Design Paradigm, aiming to identify the indicators of the proposed application, using the Octalysis gamification framework.in publicatio

Connecting Families and Schools of Students with Deafness: Describing the ICT and Internet use in Education

The use of ICT, namely of internet-based solutions, on de education of students with deafness promotes their access to a wide variety of information and experiences, by decreasing the communication barriers implied in those special needs individuals. In this study was used a self-administered questionnaire, with closed-set questions, validated through the contribution of a team of experts and a prior pilot study. Then, the families and professionals that take part of the educational community of these students were asked to share their knowledge about their ideas concerning ICT and internet roles in the education of students with deafness. Results show that these subjects have access and frequently use a wide range of technologies and web services, being more frequently used the ones concerned with online search, productivity tools and e-mail. The need for more training in this area is referred by most of the subjects. Although acknowledging the positive influence that the internet can have in both the academic achievement and future career of the students with deafness, the subjects also express that these individuals are also in need of more training to make a critical use of the internet.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Dietitians and nutritionists behaviour on Social Media: a scoping literature review

Sem resumo disponível.publishe

Public Health on Instagram: an analysis of health promotion strategies of Portugal and Brazil

Despite the increasing use of social media in Health Promotion (HP) and Public Health, studies indicate that health entities have difficulties guaranteeing citizens’ participation in these platforms. This exploratory study analyzed the topics covered and the interactions with followers on the Instagram profiles of both the National Health Service (NHS) from Portugal and of the Ministry of Health (MH) from Brazil, in 2019. The sample showed that nationals HP agendas compete with political topics: of the 208 posts from the NHS, 19.2% were about the government, and of the 424 posts from the MH, 32.20% were institutional. Fifty-three health topics were mapped in the NHS profile and 63 in the MH profile. In Portugal, there wasn’t interaction with followers and in Brazil, the interaction was reduced. It is necessary to refine communication strategies to increase the reach of these profiles and encourage participation.publishe

What are Dietitians and Nutritionists doing on social media? A proposal of an online survey

Registered Dietitians and Nutritionists (RDNs) have been taking on a role as communicators on social media. This phenomenon is in line with nutritional culture defending the right way of eating based on their scientific knowledge. It is necessary to understand new dynamics between RDNs and social media users. Under this context an online survey was created to understand how these health professionals carry out their role on social media to promote health issues, to become known, to communicate with their followers and patients. This paper describes the creation process of the online survey to be submitted to RDNs from Portugal using Design Thinking method.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

An iTV audio description service: suggesting requirements and features for visually impaired users

The ongoing Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) switchover leads to an interesting opportunity for the implementation of advanced television services. Actually, these services can even be interactive, since it is foreseen that the required Set-Top Boxes (STB) could be equipped with an Internet connection. However, among the future clients of DTT there are a large number of elderly and visually impaired people who can not entirely benefit of these services due to their physical limitations. Nevertheless, considering that Interactive Television (iTV) services can contribute to improve life quality of this type of users, it is essential to apply accessibility, usability and design-oriented guidelines for their development. In this context, this paper introduces a research related to universal design applied to iTV, being its aim to propose an advanced and accessible audio description service. In order to perceive the visually impaired users’ problems and needs, a group of individuals was asked to participate in an interview

Comunidades en línea para la inclusión digital de alumnos con sordera

Online communities exist in different contexts of education, where access and use of web tools is also growing. Search in this article fit this potential for learning communities that include students with deafness, and identify key characteristics that they must not only have to promote the educational success of this group of pupils with special educational needs, but also the highest quality of participation parental leave. It appears that the increasing availability of multimedia content is a facilitator of a particular form for deaf students, who have the video and image formats preferred access to information. Online communities through the dissemination of specific information on deafness, access to content covered in the classroom without restrictions of time and space, and sharing of needs and experiences in school and family can contribute to greater parental involvement and the school-family approach.Las comunidades en línea existen en los diferentes contextos de la educación, donde el acceso y el uso de herramientas de la web también creciendo. Este artículo trata de explicar, a través de la base teórica, el beneficio para las comunidades de aprendizaje de alumnos con sordera, e identificar las características clave que debe tener para no sólo promover el éxito educativo de este grupo de alumnos con necesidades educativas especiales, sino también la más alta calidad de la participación de los padres en la aprendizaje de sus hijos. La creciente disponibilidad de contenidos multimedia es un facilitador de una forma particular para los estudiantes sordos, que prefieren acceder a información a través de vídeo e imagen. Las comunidades en línea a través de la difusión de información específica sobre la sordera, el acceso a los contenidos tratados en el aula, sin restricciones de tiempo y espacio, y el intercambio de necesidades y experiencias en la escuela y la familia pueden contribuir a una mayor participación de los padres y acercamiento escuela-familia.ién est

A mobile app to support clinical diagnosis of upper respiratory problems (eHealthResp): co-design approach

Background: The misuse of antibiotics is a global public health issue that fosters bacterial resistance and jeopardizes generational health. The development of validated tools such as web-based courses and mobile apps to enhance clinical decisions in upper respiratory infections is of great importance in reducing the incorrect use of antibiotics in these situations. Objective: The aim of this study was to design and prevalidate the interface of a mobile app to assist and provide clinical support in the diagnosis of upper respiratory problems. We aimed to assess the adequacy and usability of the interface of the tool in the belief that it could be beneficial to health care delivery in the clinical decision setting. Methods: Using a co-design approach that brought together professionals in interface design and experts in pharmacology and pharmacoepidemiology, the mobile app interface was evaluated through peer review sessions held by interface design professionals on a heuristic survey. The reviewers accessed a high-fidelity interactive mock-up of the interface and filled in a questionnaire to assess the dimensions of layout and visual design and navigation and tasks. The resulting feedback of this evaluation supported the redesign of the primary interface, which was assessed for the second time by 2 of the previously mentioned reviewers. Results: With 4 as the highest score, the interface scored a mean of 3.16 (SD 0.45; median of the means 3.2) for layout and visual design and a mean of 3.43 (SD 0.33; median of the means 3.51) for navigation and tasks, reflecting an overall positive evaluation. The open-ended commentaries allowed us to better understand specific recommendations of the reviewers. Throughout this section, approximately 0.98 comments per parameter were registered, reflecting a high level of effectiveness of the chosen parameters in identifying potential problems. The resultant beta version of the interface, addressing the majority of the detected problems, was further assessed by 2 of the previous reviewers, validating the new design. Future tests with physicians and pharmacists will help assess credibility and user experience dimensions. Conclusions: Our study revealed that the designed interface is easy to interpret and use. Peer reviewers raised important issues that could be easily fixed and positively reassessed. As a result, the study enabled us to produce a new tool for interface usability assessment and a set of recommendations for developing mobile interfaces for clinical decision support systems in the scope of upper respiratory problems.publishe

Procedures of user-centered usability assessment for digital solutions: scoping review of reviews reporting on digital solutions relevant for older adults

The assessment of usability is a complex process that involves several steps and procedures. It is important to standardize the evaluation and reporting of usability procedures across studies to guide researchers, facilitate comparisons across studies, and promote high-quality usability studies. The first step to standardizing is to have an overview of how usability study procedures are reported across the literature.publishe

Conceção de uma plataforma de mediação digital para a Região Centro

Nesta comunicação apresentam-se os resultados referentes ao estudo e especificação de uma plataforma digital, concebida para dar suporte a processos de inovação de base territorial da região Centro de Portugal. Os resultados apresentados são focados nas funcionalidades de mediação, embora outras funcionalidades, nomeadamente relativas ao registo e partilha de dados sobre utilizadores e atividades e à comunicação entre agentes, sejam também relevantes na plataforma. A proposta aqui apresentada resulta da análise e discussão dos resultados obtidos pela transcrição e análise preliminar de dois grupos focais e do conhecimento obtido nas etapas iniciais do estudo. Com base nestes resultados foi possível definir as dinâmicas de mediação e hipermediação, assim como a listagem de funcionalidades a implementar na plataforma.publishe