At the OU we will soon commence conducting an elicitation study to understand privacy concerns of older adults (age 60+ without any serious mobility conditions or severe cognitive impairment) in Milton Keynes. This will involve 5 focus group studies with groups of 4-5 participants who are presented with a set of questions related to their daily routine, privacy and associated safety concerns. The first part of the study consists of questions to be answered individually by the participants and would take 20-30 minutes.  The second part of the study consists of questions to be looked upon collectively and would involve moderated discussions. This part would last up to 1 hour. The sessions would be conducted with the help of AgeUK, Milton Keynes.
 
We are also planning to develop technologies that could be embedded into the daily routine activities of the older adults, could sense important activities and parameters for well being and still remain non-intrusive in nature. One of the examples is having a shoe with pressure sensing grid in the insole and an Accelerometer or GPS sensing unit in the out sole. It would help to measure (a) activity levels, (b) walking styles, (c) falls and (d) whether the older participants went out or not. Users don’t need to remember wearing a separate gadget every time as they would wear shoes as a habit.