Voice2Connect: Informing the Design of Smart Speakers for Social Connectedness in Low-Income Older Adults

项目总结/摘要 有一个越来越多的公共卫生关注社会孤立和孤独的低风险， 收入老年人及其对他们寿命和总体福祉的影响。社会问题 隔离是特别相关的低收入老年住房（LISH）居民谁往往有多种慢性 条件和残疾、缺乏财政和社会资源以及社交网络有限。因此， 迫切需要开发创新方法，以减轻生活在LISH的老年人的这些问题。声音- 操作智能扬声器有可能减少这一人群的社交孤立和孤独， 例如，通过与其他人联系，发送有关社交活动的提醒，或提供 会话代理。免提语音控制为人们提供了更好的可访问性和可用性 识字率低、视力受损、行动受限或灵活性差的患者。我们建议研究如何 智能扬声器可以支持LISH中独居老年人的社会联系需求。我们 将使用迭代的以用户为中心的设计，并采用混合方法，结合参与性 方法，焦点小组访谈，功能和心理社会健康问卷。的具体目标 本研究的目的是：（1）确定社交孤立体验、用户需求、用户情境和偏好 与在LISH环境中使用智能扬声器进行社会联系有关，（2）评估老年人 （智能音箱用户和非用户）和利益相关者对智能音箱在家中使用的态度 促进社会参与，重点关注技术的感知可用性和有用性，以及（3） 确定老年人和利益相关者中潜在的实施障碍和隐私问题。 利益相关者将包括住房工作人员（N=10）和医疗保健专业人员（N=6）， 为LISH居民提供健康服务。老年人（N=36）将组成六个焦点小组，并参加一系列 三个焦点小组会议，他们参与以用户为中心的设计活动，以确定潜在的 智能扬声器功能，可以支持社会联系的需求。他们的想法和想法将被 用于开发低保真原型和每个原型的使用场景。原型和场景之后 发展，我们将寻求从老年人，住房工作人员和卫生保健提供者的投入，通过重点 这将被用于改进原型。改进后的原型将与老年人一起验证 参与者我们将使用主题分析和归纳编码的方法来分析焦点小组访谈 成绩单描述性统计将用于分析从老年人中收集的问卷数据， 持份者这项研究的结果将为我们未来的研究提供信息，我们将在那里构建智能扬声器算法 以及可以促进基于智能扬声器的创新社交连接规划的功能 对LISH中的老年人进行干预。

Project Summary/Abstract There is a growing public health concern regarding the high risk of social isolation and loneliness among low- income older adults and its resulting impact on their longevity and overall well-being. The issue of social isolation is particularly relevant to low-income senior housing (LISH) residents who often have multiple chronic conditions and disabilities, lack of financial and social resources, and limited social networks. Thus, there is an urgent need to develop innovative approaches to mitigate these issues in older adults living in LISH. Voice- operated smart speakers have the potential to reduce social isolation and loneliness in this population, for example, by connecting with other people, sending a reminder about social activities, or providing a conversational agent. The hands-free voice control provides improved accessibility and usability for people with low literacy, vision impairment, mobility limitation, or poor dexterity issues. We propose to examine how smart speakers can support the needs of social connectedness among older adults living alone in LISH. We will use an iterative user-centered design and employ a mixed-methods approach, incorporating participatory methods, focus group interviews, and functional and psychosocial health questionnaires. The specific aims of this study are: (1) to determine experiences of social isolation, user needs, user context, and preferences related to the use of smart speakers for social connectedness in the LISH setting, (2) to evaluate older adults (smart speaker users and non-users)’ and stakeholders’ attitudes towards the in-home use of smart speakers for promoting social engagement, with a focus on perceived usability and usefulness of the technology, and (3) to identify potential implementation barriers and privacy concerns among older adults and stakeholders. Stakeholders will include housing staff members (N=10) and health care professionals (N=6) providing wellness services to LISH residents. Older adults (N=36) will form six focus groups and take part in a series of three focus group sessions in which they participate in user-centered design activities to identify potential smart speaker features that can support the needs of social connectedness. Their thoughts and ideas will be used to develop low-fidelity prototypes and scenarios of use for each prototype. After prototype and scenario development, we will seek input from the older adults, housing staff, and health care providers through focus groups, which will be used to refine the prototype. The refined prototypes will be validated with the older adult participants. We will use a thematic analysis and inductive coding method to analyze focus group interview transcripts. Descriptive statistics will be used to analyze the questionnaire data collected from older adults and stakeholders. Findings from this study will inform our future research where we build smart speaker algorithms and functionalities that can facilitate the planning of innovative smart speaker-based social connectedness interventions for older adults in LISH.