Radosław Nielek

Kinga Skorupska, Manuel Núñez, Wiesław Kopeć et al.

In this paper we report the results of a pilot study comparing the older and younger adults' interaction with an Android TV application which enables users to detect errors in video subtitles. Overall, the interaction with the TV-mediated crowdsourcing system relying on language profficiency was seen as intuitive, fun and accessible, but also cognitively demanding; more so for younger adults who focused on the task of detecting errors, than for older adults who concentrated more on the meaning and edutainment aspect of the videos. We also discuss participants' motivations and preliminary recommendations for the design of TV-enabled crowdsourcing tasks and subtitle QA systems.

Kinga Skorupska, Manuel Nuñez, Wiesław Kopeć et al.

In this paper we describe the insights from an exploratory qualitative pilot study testing the feasibility of a solution that would encourage older adults to participate in online crowdsourcing tasks in a non-computer scenario. Therefore, we developed an Android TV application using Amara API to retrieve subtitles for TEDx talks which allows the participants to detect and categorize errors to support the quality of the translation and transcription processes. It relies on the older adults' innate skills as long-time native language users and the motivating factors of this socially and personally beneficial task. The study allowed us to verify the underlying concept of using Smart TVs as interfaces for crowdsourcing, as well as possible barriers, including the interface, configuration issues, topics and the process itself. We have also assessed the older adults' interaction and engagement with this TV-enabled online crowdsourcing task and we are convinced that the design of our setup addresses some key barriers to crowdsourcing by older adults. It also validates avenues for further research in this area focused on such considerations as autonomy and freedom of choice, familiarity, physical and cognitive comfort as well as building confidence and the edutainment value.

Wiesław Kopeć, Radosław Nielek, Adam Wierzbicki

This paper presents a new method of engaging older participants in the process of application and IT solutions development for older adults for emerging IT and tech startups. A new method called SPIRAL (Support for Participant Involvement in Rapid and Agile software development Labs) is proposed which adds both sustainability and flexibility to the development process with older adults. This method is based on the participatory approach and user empowerment of older adults with the aid of a bootstrapped Living Lab concept and it goes beyond well established user-centered and empathic design. SPIRAL provides strategies for direct involvement of older participants in the software development processes from the very early stage to support the agile approach with rapid prototyping, in particular in new and emerging startup environments with limited capabilities, including time, team and resources.

Bartłomiej Balcerzak, Wiesław Kopeć, Radosław Nielek et al.

With the growing number of older adults who adopt mobile technology in their life, a new form of challenge faces both them, as well as the software engineering communities. This challenge is the issue of safety, not only in the context of risk older adults already face on-line, but also, due to the mobile nature of the used applications, real life safety issues raising from the use of on-line solutions. In this paper, we wish to use a case study they conducted in order to address this issue of interrelating on-line and real life threats. We describe how the observation from the case study relate to the collected body off knowledge in the relevant topic, as well as propose a set of suggestion for improving the design of applications in regards to addressing the issue of older adults safety.

Bartłomiej Balcerzak, Radosław Nielek

In this paper we present our exploratory findings related to extracting knowledge and experiences from a community of senior tourists. By using tools of qualitative analysis as well as review of literature, we managed to verify a set of hypotheses related to the content created by senior tourists when participating in on-line communities. We also produced a codebook, representing various themes one may encounter in such communities. This codebook, derived from our own qualitative research, as well a literature review will serve as a basis for further development of automated tools of knowledge extraction. We also managed to find that older adults more often than other poster in tourists forums, mention their age in discussion, more often share their experiences and motivation to travel, however they do not differ in relation to describing barriers encountered while traveling.

Wiesław Kopeć, Katarzyna Abramczuk, Bartłomiej Balcerzak et al.

This paper presents a cooperative location-based game for the elderly with the use of tablets equipped with mobile application. The game was designed to tackle at once several crucial topics related to the issue of aging, namely the social inclusion, education in the field of modern technology, motivation for learning as well as physical activity. Mixed-aged teams consisting of two players: a junior and a senior took part in the game. The preliminary results suggest that the game can successfully address a number of issues including improving the elderly technical skills, increasing the elderly physical activity as well as positive intergenerational interaction. The paper describes the game setup in details and presents some initial data gathered during the gameplay.

Bartłomiej Balcerzak, Wiesław Kopeć, Radosław Nielek et al.

In this paper we present the report on the design and development of a platform for the inter-generational exchange of favors. This platform was designed using participatory design approach during a 24-hour hackathon by a team consisting of younger programmers and older adults. The findings of this report show that inter-generational cooperation in which the older adults serve as representatives of the end user, not only improves the design and development of the application, but also provides an effective method for designing and applying solutions aimed at improving the security of older adults while using online and mobile tools.