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Interactive multimedia content for older adults: the case of SeniorChannel

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Abstract

Interactive multimodal content fruition is increasingly available on platforms accessible via smart televisions (TVs), personal computers (PCs), or tablets. Based on the case of SeniorChannel TV, this paper contributes to understanding whether this format can meet the needs of older users. The paper first describes SeniorChannel TV and the usability guidelines according to which it was designed. It then reports two user studies, one of which was carried out in the field with seven test households and focused on usability. The second study was carried out in experience labs in Italy and Spain with 20 participants and assessed users’ satisfaction and an active audience’s experience with the final prototype. The paper offers encouraging results on the potential of interactive multimodal content to support an active audience experience, and it describes the double-level at which accessibility can be ensured.

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Notes

  1. Due to technical problems, two participants could not complete the task list. Therefore, the results of the video analysis refer to six users; four of them had university degrees, and two did not.

  2. In item 3.5, only the 11 participants who directly controlled the remote were included in the analysis since the item evaluates the ease of use of the voting procedure.

  3. Two participants who did not vote because the system crashed before they had the opportunity to do so were excluded from the analysis of the following items assessing the feeling of being an active audience (items 2.2, 2.5, 3.4, 3.5, 3.7, 3.8, 3.10, and 3.17).

  4. Only post-test scores were included in this computation. Scores of items with a negative formulation were reversed to compute general scores.

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Acknowledgments

The study was partially funded by the European Ambient Assisted Living Joint Program through the SeniorChannel project (AAL-2009-2-090).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. HTLab, Department of General Psychology, University of Padua, via Venezia 8, 35131, Padova, Italy

    Valeria Orso, Anna Spagnolli & Luciano Gamberini

  2. Brainstorm, Valencia, Spain

    Francisco Ibañez

  3. University of Alicante, Alicante, Spain

    Maria Elena Fabregat

Authors
  1. Valeria Orso
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  2. Anna Spagnolli
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  3. Luciano Gamberini
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  4. Francisco Ibañez
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  5. Maria Elena Fabregat
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Correspondence to Anna Spagnolli.

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Orso, V., Spagnolli, A., Gamberini, L. et al. Interactive multimedia content for older adults: the case of SeniorChannel. Multimed Tools Appl 76, 5171–5189 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-016-3553-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-016-3553-5

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