Exploring Use of Digital Home Assistants for Older Adults: A Demonstration Project

Emerging digital home assistant technology has potential to support older adults in their homes. Voice-activated assistants can be used for entertainment, environmental control, physical activities, health management, and social engagement. However, many older adults have limited experience with these devices, which are not designed with them in mind. We conducted a demonstration project to explore how seven older adult assisted and independent living residents interacted with digital assistants over four months. We conducted monthly semi-structured telephone interviews and pre/post questionnaires. Participants desired to use their devices to communicate with others, and for a range of health activities, including nutrition tracking, medication management, and health information searching. However, numerous usability barriers emerged. Some participants perceived their device as a social companion. These findings indicate that older adults are willing to use digital assistants for various activities that may enhance independence, although instructional and training materials are needed to support their use.

"A Robot Is Watching You”: Humanoid Robots And The Different Impacts On Privacy

Robots, particularly the ones that belong to a special type of robotic technologies designed and deployed for communicating and interacting with humans, slip into more and more domains of human life - from the research laboratories and operating rooms to our kitchens, bedrooms, and offices. They can interact with humans with facial expressions, gaze directions, and voices, mimicking the affective dynamics of human relationships. As a result, they create new opportunities, but also new challenges and risks to peoples’ privacy. The literature on privacy issues in the context of Social Companion Robots (SCRs) is poor and has a strong focus on information privacy and data protection. It has given, however, less attention to other dimensions of privacy, e.g. physical, emotional, or social privacy. This article argues for an “evolving” or “transformable” notion of privacy, as opposed to the “elusive” concept of privacy elaborated by leading privacy theorists such as Daniel J. Solove (2008) and Judith J. Thomson (1975). In other words, rather than assuming that privacy has a single core or definition (as defined, e.g., in Warren and Brandeis' 1890 paper), it maintains that it is important to conceptualize privacy as distinguishable into various aspects, including informational privacy, the privacy of thoughts and actions, and social privacy. This inductive approach makes it possible to identify new dimensions of privacy and therefore effectively respond to the rapid technological evolution in AI technologies which is constantly introducing new spheres of privacy intrusions.

Improved Deep Convolutional Neural Network with Age Augmentation for Facial Emotion Recognition in Social Companion Robotics

Facial emotion recognition (FER) is a critical component for affective computing in social companion robotics. Current FER datasets are not sufficiently age-diversified as they are predominantly adults excluding seniors above fifty years of age which is the target group in long-term care facilities. Data collection from this age group is more challenging due to their privacy concerns and also restrictions under pandemic situations such as COVID-19. We address this issue by using age augmentation which could act as a regularizer and reduce the overfitting of the classifier as well. Our comprehensive experiments show that improving a typical Deep Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) architecture with facial age augmentation improves both the accuracy and standard deviation of the classifier when predicting emotions of diverse age groups including seniors. The proposed framework is a promising step towards improving a participant’s experience and interactions with social companion robots with affective computing.

REDESIGN OF JOINT BUSINESS GROUP MANAGEMENT (KUBE) THROUGH DEVELOPMENT OF GROUP SOCIAL COMPANION MODELS

This study aims to develop a social companion model of the Joint Business Group (KUBE). There were 50 research respondents consisting of KUBE management and assistants in Pangkalpinang. The research method uses a mixed approach. Based on the results of the study, the KUBE social companion model that was developed is the professional assistance model, which starts with the process of selective recruitment of KUBE companions based on competency, followed by training, as well as the obligation to report KUBE developments periodically. In addition, this research produced the following findings: (1) 67% of training had an impact on companion skills; (3) There is a gap between the supply material and the companion needs by 50%; (4) It is necessary to improve the quality of the accompanying supplies both in terms of material, method, duration of implementation, instructor and training media; and (5) 58% of KUBE management felt that the mentor was able to help KUBE activities.

PENGARUH KEMAMPUAN KOMUNIKASI INTERPERSONAL PENDAMPING SOSIAL DENGAN ANGGOTA KELOMPOK USAHA BERSAMA TERHADAP KINERJA USAHA EKONOMI PRODUKTIF DI KOTA BANJARMASIN

Sosial assistant interpersonal communication is a process of interpersonal interaction is done by social assistant with members of the Business Group (KUBE) in developing productive economic activities in the city of Banjarmasin by using verbal and non-verbal communication. Thesis research method is quantitative research. Place of research conducted in the city of Banjarmasin.The research objective was to determine whether there is influence interpersonal communication skills are built between social companion with members UsahaBersama Group (KUBE) in developing productive economic activities in the city of Banjarmasin.Our research found that there is a significant relationship between interpersonal communication skills with a social companion KUBE members in developing productive economic activities in the city of Banjarmasin through a cognitive approach. There is influence between interpersonal communication skills with a social companion KUBE members in developing productive economic activities in the city of Banjarmasin through emotional approach. There is a relationship between the ability -komunikasi interpersonal social companion with KUBE members in developing productive economic activities in the city of Banjarmasin fun approach.Suggestion of this research to the Social Welfare Office of South Kalimantan Province should be better in fostering the social companion and member of the Joint Business Group (KUBE) that will be established good cooperation in developing productive economic activities that already exist for more advanced and developed. Need further research to determine other factors that could affect the development of productive economic activities of members of the Joint Business Group (KUBE). Keywords: Interpersonal Communication, Member of KUBE, Banjarmasin