Designing Social Exergame to Enhance Intergenerational Interaction and Exercise

Abstract

This paper describes a social exergame, aiming at promoting intergenerational interaction between older adults and young people, in which an older adult and a young person team up as a pair to reach the goals. Different interactions and mechanisms were designed for older adults and young people in consideration of their variations in mental and physical abilities. Motion capture by webcam was implemented and used as an interaction mechanism for older adults to play the exergame, while young people using NEONEO balance ball, a tangible interaction device, to control the game character. Although they were given different tasks, there are requirements for communication and cooperation within the pair (older adults and young people). The design process and system implementation were presented. And the Evaluation scheme was designed to test if the exergame could provide a way for intergenerational interaction between young and old, which will be of benefit for both generations. Contributions of this paper include knowledge of designing and implementing such exergame and the study on this topic can be the reference for other researchers in the relevant area.