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Memory:
Machine learning for the elderly
In the reflection of apply hi-tech to real life, I looked into minor groups of people - the elderly, and exploration on how they can benefit from machine learning in psychological aspects.
Design Brief
Responsibilities and Skills
Product Designer
User Research
Quick Draft
Mock-up and Testing
CMF
Digital 3D Development
This is project focuses on care for elder people. Through research, I find that although there are diverse products in the current market which do aware of the inconvenience of elder people, however, there is little attention paid to their psychological aspects. Therefore, from the perspective of the users, I designed a interactive device which based on machine learning and can provide more emotion care for the elder.
Project Type
Timeline and Teams
2018.
Solo work
thesis project
General Background
In cities, over 50% elders live alone or with their couples.
We call them “empty nest”.*
Over 20% elder people aged more than 60 are suffering from mental or neurological disorder.*
Mental health has an impact on physical health and vice versa.*
However, mental health problems are always ignored by doctors and family. Elder people usually do not tend to admit it.
Observation
I spent two days staying with my friends' grandma who live alone. Here are some moment inspire me most.
Most time of the day, she just in a chair with silence or listen to radio.
Except for chating with her sister who is also live alone, she has no chance to communicate with people.
she collects old photos carefully and always take them out to have a look.
As we get familiar, she shares a lot of memories with me, from her primary school to now.
Survey about those behavious
To confirm those behaviours, I prepare four problems and chat with 40 elderly people met in 2 parks
How do you think of your life? full of variety? simple ? or is it boring?
Do you often have chance to talk to others?
How often do you watch old photo?
Why do you watch old photos
Journey map: How an elderly living alone passes her daytime
What people say VS What Data says
It’s unecessary for elderly people to share things about past with their families.
The following is a psychological experient which focus on depression elder. The comparison group utilized the traditional treatment methods. On the contrary, the experimental group made use of old objects to help awake the awareness of the elder about the past. here is the result. Y refers to the degree of depression level. The higher the number, the more negative feelings they hold.
But look into past with the company of old photo is so good for elderly people’s mental health.
How might we
Create a warm heart experience for elderly people who like to watch old photos?
What they need
Sympathetic
Seeking resonance is human instinct. Old people living alone have few friends, there is little information that resonates with them. They are eager to resonate.
Companion
The reason why elder people often turn on thee radio and TV when they are at home lies in that they hope to get a sense of companionship.
Fresh information
Monotonous life, boring TV shows make them more lonely. Fresh information can also help their mental health
How we do
The device can automatically identify the life tracks of the elders and then help to find friends who share the same experience with themselves.
Elderly people put photos in a “box”
This box will play the photos as well as the corresponding songs of that age
Technology support: Machine learning
Public sources can provide large numbers of digitally archived photos taken over the past century with known dates, it’s relatively straight forward to obtain labeled data (dated photos, in this case) with which to train this network. Once the network is trained, we can feed in a photo, and we get out the year in which the system guesses it was taken.
Input image
Convolution
Max pooling
“Fully Connected” Network
Output
2D Development
Mockup testing and feedback
In order to make sure whether my design was in line with the ergonomics principles, as well as whether the buttons are comprehensible enough for the elder to use, I made a paper model. During the test, I told the grandma that it is a device which can automatically play music through identifying the information behind photos. Then, I observed the methods she used to put the music on and other actions.
she quickly found the mouth and put the photo inside.
However, she did not know how to make the music stop
She thought the mouth was little bit wide.
The switches should differ from each other
The surface should be more slope
The mouth is too loose
The buttons for volume and channel turning can not differ from each other
Ideation
CMF inspiration
3D development
Volume
Channel turning
Switch
Previous
Pause / play
Next
When the photo is put, the music will automatically play and the mood Lighting will be turned on
Storyboard
1. An old man living with himself is looking outside the window with a sense of loneliness.
2. With the missing to the past, he puts the photo into the device.
3. The device automatically reads the information and then play the musics of the corresponding years.
4. The devices analyzes the living track of the old man and finds there are some elderly people sharing the same experience with himself. The community will organize an activity to enable them get to know each other.
4. The devices analyzes the living track of the old man and finds there are some elderly people sharing the same experience with himself. The community will organize an activity to enable them get to know each other.
5. The old man decides to go out of home, and participate in the social activity.
6. He makes some new friends and feels no more lonely.
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