Assembling mass-market technology for the sake of wellbeing: a case study on the adoption of ambient intelligent systems by older adults living at home

Abstract

© 2017, Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany.Everyday more and more ubiquitous applications are developed to support aging in place and ambient assisted living. Although these technologies typically adhere to the functional requirements defined by their developers, many of these solutions evidence limitations for being adopted by end-users, i.e., older adults. This paper reports the authors’ experience in the design and deployment of several iterations of the SocialConnector system—a computer-supported family communication mediator—as a case study that helps identify key factors that ease the adoption of ambient intelligent systems encouraging intergenerational family communication at home. The particularity of the followed approach is to assemble widely available mass-market technology—such as commercial Tablet PCs and TV displays—glued together with innovative software, as a way to drive system adoption through economically affordable hardware running over empirically-driven considerations f