From a Common Chair to a Device that Issues Reminders to Seniors

Over the years, people tend to fail to recall different activities of everyday life, especially those that are performed less frequently. Forgetting a medical appointment, a family member’s birthday, or to take a medicine, is a common problem for many older adults. Although Information and Communication Technologies provide several options to help older adults remember activities like these, many of them could feel discouraged by not being able to properly use these tools and take full advantage of them. In other cases, elderly people may feel intimidated and even refuse to interact with technological devices. For these reasons, this paper proposes the use of a conventional object, which can be found in any home, to help older adults remember certain activities. Specifically, an ordinary chair has been selected to be employed as a device to provide the necessary reminders. The reminders implemented in the designed prototype are provided by audio, lights and vibrations, things that users do not notice at first sight the presence of technology in the chair. This prototype was evaluated through a user study with the collaboration of older adults. The results of the evaluation were positive, which concludes that the proposal has a favorable reception. Thus, this proposal could provide an important contribution to the major goal of helping to improve the quality of life of the elderly population.