Identifying the Needs of Elderly for Technological Innovations in the Smart Home

Abstract

The study used Projective Testing techniques to identify the needs of elderly users of various features in a smart home, including: telemedicine, customized computer, teleconferencing, teleshopping, event reminder, robot helper and smart pets. Drawings of home scenarios and a male user were shown to 18 elderly users of service apartments. Altogether 192 different needs were identified. These were sorted by HF experts into broad categories. Nine categories of needs emerged relating to: Health, Communication, Security, Mobility, Mental Activities, Physical Activities, Prestige, Independence and Dependence. These were compared to needs structures documented in the literature including: Transcendent, Optimization, Anti-ageing, Dependency Avoidance and Nurturance Seeking. These needs structures are expressed at a higher level of abstraction then our nine categories. In addition the nine needs categories identified in this study can be used as a point of departure for the design of a smart home.