Evaluating a smartphone-based social participation app for the elderly

Abstract

Hyper-aging societies are looking for ways to support their elderly populations and mitigate aging-related societal challenges. One way to do this is by increasing elders’ social participation in the workforce and their communities. Towards this end, an opportunity-matching app for Japanese elders called GBER (Gathering Brisk Elderly in the Region) was created and deployed in a large Japanese city. In this paper, we report on the results of a usability and user experience (UX) study that evaluated a new version of the app’s user interface (UI), which was redesigned for smartphones based on feedback from current users and by taking an elder-centric design approach. The study, which involved representative elderly users, revealed several insights about the use of flat UI design, conceptual transferability of common app iconography, information reading patterns, and persona and scenario methodology. It also confirmed the diversity of Japanese elders interests and skills, providing further empirical support for the need for an opportunity-matching service like GBER.