Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
1.4. Technological trends and barriers in AAL
The field of AAL is really wide and complex, and is characterized by various trends
and barriers. Trends could be identified by demographical point of view, considering a
growing number of older people living autonomously and in need of health and care
services, an higher number of retired senior citizens who are able to spend their money
on products for safety, security, entertainment and communications needs, a changing
family relationships and living situations (e.g. larger geographic distances between
relatives) affecting the level of support that family members can give, and an ageing
workforce in general and the need to keep older people active in the society and at
work; by economical point of view, considering a growing number of new customized
or tailored services in hospital, telemedicine, home-care organization.
Besides the trends discussed above, it is also important to recognize that there are
also barriers that hinder the deployment of AAL. These obstacles can be identified for
each stakeholder of AAL: users and caregivers (primary stakeholders); organisations
offering services (secondary stakeholders); organisations supplying goods and services
(tertiary stakeholders); organisations analysing the economical and legal context of
AAL (quaternary stakeholders).
Demographical and socio-economical aspects for trends and barriers are out of the
scope of this document; therefore they are widely described and analyzed in the policy
document of the AALIANCE project. Instead technological aspects are here discussed.
1.4.1.
Technological trends
Ambient intelligence, ubiquitous or pervasive computing, robotics - all expressions
stand for a reference to electronic environments that are sensitive and responsive to the
presence of people through the provision of an intelligent social user interface which is
the basis for Ambient Assisted Living. Technologies that are used for building AAL
systems or applications are predominantly understood in a sense that they shall be:
•
embedded (non invasive or invisible devices);
distributed throughout the environment or directly integrated into appliances
or furniture;
•
personalized (tailored to the users' needs);
•
adaptive (responsive to the user and the user's environment);
•
anticipatory (anticipating users' desires as far as possible without conscious
mediation).
•
On top of this, in AAL systems, technical and functional factors need to be
integrated in a way that takes into account the user needs and the user knowledge. As a
user traverses various physical (room, home, car, workplace, shops, out-doors) and
virtual spaces (e-shopping, gaming, chatting, searching for or planning activities)
during the day, high requirements towards integration and interoperability are to be
fulfilled. In AAL these different functions, provided by a heterogeneous set of
disciplines (e. g. advanced human/machine interfaces, sensors, microelectronics,
software, web & network technologies, energy generation or harvesting, control
technologies, new materials and robotics), have to be integrated in a system that offers
applications and services in a user-centred way. While ICT-enabled products in the
field of walking aids or telemonitoring could be developed along already existing
