TY - JOUR
T1 - Enhancing social interaction in nursing homes through public tabletop displays
T2 - A field study of R2S
AU - Hengeveld, Bart
AU - Hummels, Caroline
AU - Kang, Ye
AU - Hu, Jun
A2 - Kang, Kai
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 Elsevier Inc.
PY - 2024/11/1
Y1 - 2024/11/1
N2 - The prevalence of social isolation among nursing home residents highlights the need for innovative solutions to enhance their social interactions and wellbeing. Despite extensive efforts over recent decades to develop in-room systems or public applications under caregivers’ supervision, there remains a gap in designing public social technologies that can be integrated into residents’ daily lives. Furthermore, the challenges associated with low adoption and the complexities of evaluating such technologies in public care settings have limited our understanding of their impact on residents' social activities and experiences. To address this, our study introduces R2S, a tabletop display system designed to encourage older adults to view, share, and discuss news articles collaboratively in public care environments. A 6-week field trial was conducted in a Dutch care home to investigate the influence on residents’ daily social activities, R2S's utilization, and residents’ perceived user experiences and social emotions. The results reveal that R2S can generally promote daily social interactions among residents, even altering their long-established social habits. Five usage patterns of social technologies within public care environments were identified to provide insights into designing systems in comparable contexts. The participants reported a highly positive user experience with the system. Although their affective social benefits were not significant, they substantially outweighed the affective costs. These findings not only deepen the understanding of how technology can enhance social interaction in public care settings but also provide insights to inform the design and implementation of related technologies in the future.
AB - The prevalence of social isolation among nursing home residents highlights the need for innovative solutions to enhance their social interactions and wellbeing. Despite extensive efforts over recent decades to develop in-room systems or public applications under caregivers’ supervision, there remains a gap in designing public social technologies that can be integrated into residents’ daily lives. Furthermore, the challenges associated with low adoption and the complexities of evaluating such technologies in public care settings have limited our understanding of their impact on residents' social activities and experiences. To address this, our study introduces R2S, a tabletop display system designed to encourage older adults to view, share, and discuss news articles collaboratively in public care environments. A 6-week field trial was conducted in a Dutch care home to investigate the influence on residents’ daily social activities, R2S's utilization, and residents’ perceived user experiences and social emotions. The results reveal that R2S can generally promote daily social interactions among residents, even altering their long-established social habits. Five usage patterns of social technologies within public care environments were identified to provide insights into designing systems in comparable contexts. The participants reported a highly positive user experience with the system. Although their affective social benefits were not significant, they substantially outweighed the affective costs. These findings not only deepen the understanding of how technology can enhance social interaction in public care settings but also provide insights to inform the design and implementation of related technologies in the future.
KW - Field trial
KW - Nursing homes
KW - Public displays
KW - Social interaction
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85205949204&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.gerinurse.2024.10.006
DO - 10.1016/j.gerinurse.2024.10.006
M3 - Article
C2 - 39395270
AN - SCOPUS:85205949204
SN - 0197-4572
VL - 60
SP - 384
EP - 398
JO - Geriatric Nursing
JF - Geriatric Nursing
ER -