Information and Knowledge Management using ArcGIS ModelBuilder

Evaluating ICT Based Services for Older Users
Minna Isomursu and Marja Harjumaa
VTT, Kaitoväylä 1, Finland
minna.isomursu@vtt.fi
marja.harjumaa@vtt.fi
Abstract: This paper summarizes experiences of empirical research done for evaluating information and
communication technology (ICT) based services that aim at supporting older users in independent living. Over
the course of four years, we have explored several different ICT based service concepts in field trials. The goal of
the field trials has been to expose novel ICT based service concepts to everyday life of ageing users through
adoption of services in real life use. As a result, rich data about user experience and value of the service for
different stakeholders has been collected and analyzed. Conducting the field trials has exposed practical issues
about how to conduct research with older users. In this paper the experiences are summarized. The findings
show that older participants differ from other user groups in several ways. Researchers faced challenges with
research procedures during the field trials. These challenges were sometimes caused by exploratory nature and
limited duration of the field trial; the participants of field trials always did not want to invest on adopting the
services as their everyday routines, but instead restricted the use into testing technology and related service as
isolated objects from their everyday lives. Often, this also led into situations where participants judged the value
of the service to “someone else”, and were not willing to adopt it themselves.
Keywords: ambient assisted living, field trials, ageing technology users
1. Introduction
The ongoing change in demographics in Europe has triggered interest towards exploring the potential
of information and communication technology (ICT) based services in supporting ageing population in
independent living. ICT based services have been emerging into support everyday life, such as
banking, shopping or information services. However, their adoption has been limited with older users.
For example, only 28% of European older users aged from 55 to 74 uses Internet frequently (Eurostat
2010). Older users are not using online banking services (Pew research, 2010) as frequently as the
younger users. Sayago and Blat (2009) found out that the technology itself, users’ computer
experience and educational level do not have influence on the accessibility of the web services for
older users. Instead, the users had difficulties to remember task-related steps, understanding
technical words and using the mouse. Vastenburg et al. (2008) identified in their work barriers that
hinder the technology adoption by older users, including complexity and learnability, lack of perceived
benefit, and compatibility issues. Usability and accessibility are issues that have been extensively
studied during last couple of decades, and user interface solutions that are usable and accessible
also for older users can be designed using human-centred design practises (Newell et al. 2006).
Perhaps more often, the obstacles for adopting ICT based services are in older users’ attitudes and
feelings. According to Eisma et al. (2004) negative attitudes of older users are caused by the popular
perception of age and technology, lack of awareness of technology, the feeling that technology is not
useful for older people and the feeling that it is too difficult to use. Thus, it is important to involve older
users in design and evaluation phases of technology concepts. Field trials can be used to expose
novel ICT based service concepts to everyday life of aging users through adoption of services in real
life use. Faber and de Vos (2008) state that it is a suitable method for gathering understanding how
people use the service or application in real-life situations, what are the practical impacts of the
service in the lives of the users, how it should be improved and what is its market value (Faber and de
Vos, 2008). Field trial is a method of qualitative case research strategy (Benbasat et al. 1987), which
is often used in studying ICT products or services.
In this paper, experiences from empirical research done for evaluating ICT based services for older
users are summarized. The experiences have arisen over the course of four years from the research
work of observing and interviewing older people, and planning and supervising the research work
itself. For the purpose of this paper, we analyzed the experiences of six researchers who had been
involved in six different case studies.
2. Related work
Human-centred design is an approach to systems design and development that aims to make
interactive system more usable by focusing on the use of the system and applying human
factors/ergonomics and usability knowledge and techniques (SFS 2010). Human-centred design may
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