A User-Centred Well-Being Home for the Elderly

Abstract

Every single instant a person generates a large amount of information that somehow is lost. This information can assume a large diversity of means, such as an oral word, a sneeze, an increase in heartbeat or even facial expressions. We present a model which promotes the well-being of the elderly in their homes. The general idea behind the model is that every single experience may mean something, and therefore may be recorded, measured and even have adequate responses. There is no device that provides a more natural interaction than a human body and every one of us, sends and receives useful information, which sometimes gets lost. Trends show that the future will be filled with pervasive IoT devices, present in most aspects of human life’s. In this we focus on which aspects are more important for the well-being of a person and which devices, technologies and interactions may be used to collect data directly from users and measure their physiological and emotional responses. Even though not all the technologies presented in this article are yet mainstream, they have been evolving very rapidly and evidence makes us believe that the efficiency of this approach will be closely related to their advances.

Keywords

• ambient intelligence
• human-computer interaction
• internet of things
• smart homes