Virtual, Remote Participation in Museum Visits by Older Adults: A Feasibility Study

The goal of this paper is to understand if older adults can par-ticipate in remote museum visits with virtual environments, and which design factors would be crucial for remote partic-ipation system success. We report on a study with 30 older adult participants, identifying strong and weak points of dif-ferent designs for remote participation and identifying future design directions. Our results illustrate that different designs can change communication dynamics, exploration and navi-gation patterns, and we describe the design features that led to this. An interaction-free design was found to be the easiest to use, while virtual environments are perceived as aesthetically appealing. Implications for developers are discussed

Accessible Cultural Heritage through Explainable Artificial Intelligence

International audienceEthics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI advocate for AI technology that is, among other things, more inclusive. Explainable AI (XAI) aims at making state of the art opaque models more transparent, and defends AI-based outcomes endorsed with a rationale explanation, i.e., an explanation that has as target the non-technical users. XAI and Responsible AI principles defend the fact that the audience expertise should be included in the evaluation of explainable AI systems. However, AI has not yet reached all public and audiences , some of which may need it the most. One example of domain where accessibility has not much been influenced by the latest AI advances is cultural heritage. We propose including minorities as special user and evaluator of the latest XAI techniques. In order to define catalytic scenarios for collaboration and improved user experience, we pose some challenges and research questions yet to address by the latest AI models likely to be involved in such synergy