Developing a Multimodal Interface for the Elderly

The elderly remain excluded from technology, since they regard traditional computer interfaces as overly technical and difficult to use. However, the older users consider other forms of interaction easier to use – like touch and gesture recognition interfaces. Regarding the touch interfaces, we focused on text-entry tasks and developed and tested 5 virtual QWERTY keyboard variants in order to improve text entry speed and accuracy on tablet devices. Preliminary user tests with young adults revealed that soft keyboards without visual changes remain the fastest method for text entry, and allowed us to rule out the least promising variants. Regarding gesture recognition, we developed regular gestures as well as alternative functionalities based on the motion sensing device: user and ambient sensing. These features allow to create a more intelligent system that reacts to the user and environment without explicit interaction. In the near future, we will perform tests for both interaction modalities with older adults.