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The World population is growing older
and it is estimated that, by 2060, 30%
of the population in Europe will be over
65 years old (Eurostat, 2011).
Simultaneously, trends suggest that
smartphones will be the dominant
status quo. Hence, and due to the
current stepping into retirement of the
’Baby Boom’ generation, smartphones
will soon enough reach seniors.
Nowadays, smartphones are not
inclusively designed to bear older
adults’ needs in mind. However, if
designed with and for older adults,
smartphones have the potential to be
central in three main areas:
n Prevention of isolation;
n Promotion of autonomy and
enhanced quality of life;
S4S SMARTPHONES FOR SMART SENIORS
S4S website: www.smartphones4seniors.org
Fig1.
Contact
Rua Alfredo Allen, 455
4200-135 Porto, Portugal
+351 220 430 300
info@fraunhofer.pt
www.fraunhofer.pt
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n Improvement of health conditions.
The S4S project was devised to tackle
the unsolved problems and boost the
potential benefits of smartphones in
older adults’ lives by creating a set of
applications tailored to seniors’ needs.
Process The project covers all the stages for the
design of user-friendly applications.
Through questionnaires, focus groups
or diary studies, the project partners
have unveiled older adults’ unmet
needs, and grasped this particular
group’s everyday habits and
expectations regarding the use and
perceived usefulness of smartphones in
daily life. This resulted in personas and
scenarios which were further used all
along the design process.
Applications to: n Prevent isolation
n Promote quality of life n Improve health Partners: The S4S is a National
project involving seven
partners: Microsoft,
Optimus (mobile
operator), Fraunhofer
AICOS, two universities
(Lisbon and Aveiro) and
two SMEs (Devscope
and Wit).
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Beyond primary users (older adults)
involved in context mapping, the
project involves secondary users and
caregivers, such as gerontologists.
For the purpose of covering the three
major areas identified as crucial, the
project developed different
applications: game for fall prevention,
easy web search using natural
language, social interactions (e.g. easy
access to social networks), checking
phone balance, activity register,
appointments and reminders,
medication management and alerts.
Furthermore, the applications make use
of advanced text-to-speech and
speech-to-text technologies which were
purposefully tailored to be appealing to
older adults. The project also took into
account the cumbersome process of
authentication and set-up, which is
particularly challenging for older adults.
Therefore, S4S has created its own
remote management solution to allow
a connection between the older adult
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and a caregiver, which not only allows
the caregiver to access relevant data
(e.g. monitoring health), but also to
share data from one application to the
next, so as to free users from having to
repeatedly input the same information
on different applications. This, then,
provides an optimized user experience.
Users & Usability The project’s commitment to address
older adults’ real needs and to provide
real usable applications is proved by
thorough usability tests. These allow
the comprehensive validation and
refinement of all graphic user interfaces
(from icons, over font type, to colours),
the patterns, wording choices and
navigation, within all applications.
S4S is a project developed with and for
older adults, with confirmed usability,
and real-life application towards
improving older adults’ quality of life
and welcoming seniors to take part in
the information society.
S4S logo.
Fig2.
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