User Requirements for Inclusive Technology for Older Adults

ABSTRACT Active aging technologies are increasingly designed to support an active lifestyle. However, the way in which they are designed can raise different barriers to acceptance of and use by older adults. Their designers can adopt a negative stereotype of aging. Thorough understanding of user requirements is central to this problem. This paper investigates user requirements for technologies that encourage an active lifestyle and provide older people with the means to self-manage their physical, mental, and emotional health. This requires consideration of the person and the sociotechnical context of use. We describe our work in collecting and analyzing older adults’ requirements for a technology which enables an active lifestyle. The main contribution of the paper is a model of user requirements for inclusive technology for older people.