Persuasive Game-based Physical Therapy

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Game-based physical therapy - which harnesses the power of virtual games, motion tracking sensors, and evidence-based treatments - have been shown to provide an alternative way of delivering therapy services to clients. Jintronix has revolutionized the delivery of physical therapy through the development of Kinect-based games and therapy tools that make the completion of physical exercises more engaging while at the same time providing assessment and feedback on the patient's progress. Despite their increasing investment in game-base therapy, a major challenge remains how to design games that will motivate patients to continue with their physical therapy over the long term that is required to achieve the desired treatment outcomes. Decades of research in the field of Human-Computer Interaction and Persuasive Technology have shown that interactive technologies can be designed to persuade, motivate, increase engagement, adoption, and adherence to certain tasks. The proposed project will explore the design of persuasive interface elements for technology-enabled physical therapy that support long-term adherence "in the wild", that is, in their homes and outside of tightly monitored therapy environments. In collaboration with Jintronix, we will iteratively design and evaluate prototype persuasive and social user-interface elements that can be embedded in their systems to promote long-term engagement. Based on our design and evaluation efforts, the company will receive technical understandings of how to develop these types of systems, (in particular, user interface elements for sustaining engagement), and detailed user practices to inform their designs. This will directly aid Jintronix in their push towards home-based delivery of physical therapy. Due to the massive proliferation of technology-enabled physical therapy, successful completion of this research will lead to technological innovation that will benefit not only Jintronix, but other technology-enabled physical therapy stake holders-technology developers, healthcare professionals, and patients. The Canadian Government will benefit from low-cost approaches for designing effective technology-enabled physical therapy.