Alejandro Rodriguez-Ascaso

Challenges for inclusive affective detection in educational scenarios

There exist diverse challenges for inclusive emotions detection in educational scenarios. In order to gain some insight about the difficulties and limitations of them, we have analyzed requirements, accommodations and tasks that need to be adapted for an experiment where people with different functional profiles have taken part. Adaptations took into consideration logistics, tasks involved and user interaction techniques. The main aim was to verify to what extent the same approach, measurements and technological infrastructure already used in previous experiments were adequate for inducing emotions elicited from the execution of the experiment tasks. In the paper, we discuss the experiment arrangements needed to cope with people with different functional profiles, which include adaptations on the analysis and results. Such analysis was validated in a pilot experiment with 3 visually impaired participants.

User modeling for attending functional diversity for all in higher education

In this paper we provide our general approach and discuss relevant issues in providing a dynamic user modelling approach for attending functional diversity for accessible lifelong learning (ALL) in Higher Education. Our approach to provide universal and personalized access lies on combining user modelling and machine learning techniques to cope with the needs for ALL with a pervasive support of standards and supporting the full life cycle of service adaptation. The modelling differs from others in i) coping with interactions and context of the user that can only be considered at runtime and ii) characterising interaction capabilities of different kinds of devices. Models are used to personalize and adapt learning materials, pedagogical settings and interactions in the environment to satisfy both the individual learning needs and the access preferences, taking into account the context at hand.

Personalised Support for Students with Disabilities Based on Psychoeducational Guidelines

In this paper we present research works we are addressing in EU4ALL project (IST-2006-034778) to enable Higher Education (HE) institutions to support and attend the accessibility needs of their students. This approach is based on integrating learning and management of the learning in terms of workflows to support the different types of existing scenarios with a twofold objective. First, involving non-technical staff in their definition. Second, using standard-based learning management systems (LMS). A combination of design and runtime adaptations through IMS Learning Design (IMS-LD) specification is being used, following the aLFanet approach (IST-2001-33288).

User experience design guidelines for telecare (e-health) services

telecare can be defined as the use of ICT to support the delivery of care directly to people outside of conventional care centers, such as hospitals or residential homes. A telecare system can be as simple as providing a person with the means to alert a remote care provider of their need for assistance. More advanced systems might automatically detect the need for assistance by monitoring activity or lack of it, using ambient or body-worn sensors. Evidence suggests that telecare can reduce care costs [3]; nevertheless it has yet to become a serious alternative to hospital or residential care. The telecare installations which do succeed tend to be on a relatively small scale, and led by committed individuals with a thorough understanding of the end user (i.e. carers and their clients) needs, resulting in a system tailored to the intended user group. We believe that in order for telecare to become a successful mainstream service all stakeholders within the telecare delivery chain must pay similar strong attention to the user needs and the user experience. An ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) STF (Specialist Task Force) has produced an EG (ETSI guide) [1] designed to help telecare stakeholders develop and deliver telecare systems which provide a positive end user experience. What follows is a brief description of the methodology used in developing the EG together with some examples and discussion.

Human factors: user experience design guidelines for telecare services

The present paper introduces user experience guidelines addressing trust, user interaction (including usability and accessibility) and service aspects applicable to the research, design, development and deployment of telecare services. The work, co-funded by the European Commission and EFTA, is performed formed in ETSI and is entering its final phase of development. An ETSI Guide with the above title will be published in December 2007.

OLA! A Scenario-Based Approach to Enhance Open Learning Through Accessibility

Open Educational Resources (OER) and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) have not developed with an inherent capacity to attend to the needs of disabled students. In our research, we aim to understand the social, contextual and organisational issues behind these inadequacies. Through this, interventions and best practices can be developed to improve the situation.

Identifying enablers for future e-Services

The starting point of the project is the observation that new information and communication technologies (ICT) are often introduced without taking into account the requirements of elderly and/or disabled users, resulting in products and services that are hardly usable by those users. A method for identifying enablers for future e-Services is described. In short it identifies usability problems with future interaction technologies and map these future interaction technologies to e-Services. The results of investigations using this method allow stakeholders in different stages of the research and development lifecycle e-Services to spot potential difficulties in the design of user interfaces which could cause elderly or disabled users to experience usability issues.

User experience design guidelines for ubiquitous, mobile telecare services

Telecare is a strategic enabler for the provision of independent living to older people in their own homes in Europe, driven by demographics and new technologies. The number of elderly people and people with special needs is growing rapidly, requiring dedicated supportive efforts for those unable to cope with every day’s technology. For the elderly population, access to Telecare services is important but often difficult due to their lack of familiarity with ICT.