A Goal-Oriented Chatbot for Engaging the Elderly Through Family Photo Conversations
This addresses social isolation and cognitive health for elderly individuals, but it is an incremental application of existing goal-oriented dialogue methods to a new domain.
The researchers tackled the problem of loneliness and cognitive decline in the elderly by developing a personalized chatbot that uses family photos to stimulate conversations, resulting in increased engagement and reduced loneliness as reported in the abstract.
We propose a personalized chatbot designed for elderly individuals. The chatbot initiates discussions based on family photos, encouraging users to interact naturally. During these interactions, it generates W questions (who, where, when, and what) to stimulate cognitive function, followed by an open-ended question to promote positive reminiscence. This approach is structured around a goal-oriented dialogue framework. Additionally, after each conversation about a photo, the chatbot analyzes the discussion to identify topics that the user favors or dislikes. It then offers the user the option to chat about another photo either featuring the same family members or an individual previously mentioned in the conversation. To support this system, we have developed a web portal that allows caregivers to upload photos and review chat conversations. This personalized chatbot not only encourages elderly users to engage with the chatbot regularly and reduces feelings of loneliness but also provides caregivers with a valuable tool to gain insights into users' well-being.