For many individuals, greeting someone with a simple 'hello' is a common occurrence that can be accomplished quickly using a mobile phone. But what about older people who haven't mastered this type of resource? When they miss someone, how do they send a message like "good morning, I miss you"? It's something that might not be done if they don't have access to the necessary resources. This paper aims to explore technological empowerment for older adults by combining TV messages and voice commands. 110 people aged between 59 and 91 were interviewed to give their opinions on these two mechanisms. The main conclusions are that there is no consensus on notifications, but there is strong interest in the subject, particularly as a very familiar device is used. Voice features were fully accepted because they allow for more natural interactions, without the need for physical contact with a device. The combination of both features is another point that arouses curiosity in the group, whose opinions are described in detail throughout the paper.

Technology has been a link between people, and the use of cell phones, tablets and other devices contribute to reduce distances. However, while these devices can unite, they can also result in exclusion. That's what happens to a lot of seniors. This condition makes social isolation in this age group one of the biggest world's problems. Due to this reason, thinking of solutions aimed at the social integration of this public is extremely important to reduce the indicators of loneliness. In this study, we used a system that combines an Intelligent Personal Assistant (IPA) and interactive television (iTV) to verify if this type of approach can facilitate and promote the realization of audio calls to friends, family and caregivers. The prototype was used for seven days in a real context with people between 64 and 90 years old. In general, the acceptance of the system was quite positive and changed the routine of the participants in some way during the testing period.

In the context of Television (TV), intelligent voice assistants are still mainly based on reactive behaviours, only responding to users' requests. However, the addition of proactivity in TV assistants could have the potential to reduce the user-assistant interaction effort and bring an additional "human" layer, leading to a more organic adoption of these systems. Within this framework, this paper aims to contribute to the understanding of the relevance of a set of proactive scenarios for TV and get clues on how to design these behaviours to be efficient and avoid intrusion feelings. To this end, focus groups were conducted to discuss the conceptualised scenarios. The results showed that most of the idealized scenarios were relevant for the participants and that they will be positive if some characteristics can be pre-configured regarding the type of communication and intrusion of proactive suggestions.

A significant challenge on Assistive Technology (AT) relies on the interaction devices’ evaluation phase. Generally, the gap between users and devices is revealed during the use. This fact highlights the relevance of discussing these barriers early in the design process, mainly, in the evaluation phase. This article explores current practices of evaluation methodologies for AT interaction devices, both considering the usage of computers and TV-sets. Two research stages were performed to achieve this objective: a systematic mapping study of AT evaluation methodologies, and field research in Portugal, with experts in AT Evaluation and end-users. This last step was done through semi-structured interviews, whose results passed by a content analysis process. The findings from these researches suggest that there are vital dimensions that should be addressed when evaluating AT. Firstly, qualification issues remain most important, especially concerning to the developers’ awareness of end-user needs as, for example, difficulty in computer access. Other important points are the economic problems, involved in the acquisition of AT interaction devices, and the emotional issues related to using these devices. Finally, the article concludes with a discussion on directions for evaluation methodologies of AT interaction devices.

The growing use of second-screen devices stresses the importance of finding a balance between engagement, distraction, and disturbance of its users, while simultaneously watching television. In this framework, this article reports on a study designed to analyze the efficiency, impact, and interference of different notification strategies aiming to identify the best approach to be used when an alert is needed in second-screen scenarios.A prototype able to deliver synchronized information related with TV content, with intervals of 10, 30 and 60 s, followed by individual or combined notifications (e.g., audio, visual, and haptic—on the tablet and visual—on the TV) was developed. A laboratory adapted to replicate a living room was set up and a test that involved watching three segments of a 20-min clip while using the prototype was carried with 30 participants, under a cognitive walk-through protocol.Quantitative and qualitative results show that receiving notifications while watching TV is effective in alerting users about new information, despite its inherent cognitive disturbance for the TV viewing experience. It was also possible to highlight that in an HCI perspective, the most suitable strategy for integrating notifications (considering type and cadence) should be based on a combination of a visual notification (displayed only on the TV screen) along with a haptic notification (vibration on the tablet); spaced by an interval of at least 30 s.