IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/igg/jmhci0/v8y2016i2p1-19.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Making Space to Engage: An Open-Ended Exploration of Technology Design with Older Adults

Author

Listed:
  • Florian Güldenpfennig

    (Vienna University of Technology, Vienna, Austria)

  • Francisco Nunes

    (Vienna University of Technology, Vienna, Austria)

  • Eva Ganglbauer

    (Vienna University of Technology, Vienna, Austria)

  • Geraldine Fitzpatrick

    (Vienna University of Technology, Vienna, Austria)

Abstract

Designing for older adults can be complex. Often, designers struggle to understand people who share a very different life context. At the same time, older adults can have difficulties imagining future technologies for themselves. This creates challenges for design processes bounded by time and outcome expectations. In this paper, the authors explore a long-term, loosely structured and open-ended research process where they provided participants with prototypes to use for as long as they wanted, and only as they wanted to. By working with their own relatives and friends and moving away from structured procedures and external agendas, the authors made space for both participants and designers for deep engagements with the artifacts and process. Participants were able to better understand technology and shape it to their needs. Researchers were better able to understand and iterate on the technology designs. The authors' findings suggest that this approach might be especially appropriate for designing for and with older adults.

Suggested Citation

  • Florian Güldenpfennig & Francisco Nunes & Eva Ganglbauer & Geraldine Fitzpatrick, 2016. "Making Space to Engage: An Open-Ended Exploration of Technology Design with Older Adults," International Journal of Mobile Human Computer Interaction (IJMHCI), IGI Global, vol. 8(2), pages 1-19, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:igg:jmhci0:v:8:y:2016:i:2:p:1-19
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://services.igi-global.com/resolvedoi/resolve.aspx?doi=10.4018/IJMHCI.2016040101
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:igg:jmhci0:v:8:y:2016:i:2:p:1-19. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Journal Editor (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.igi-global.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.