The lives of informal caregivers can get so busy and overwhelmed that they stop caring for themselves. A simple daily mobile phone reminder may be enough to restore some of their self-care. In this study, we explore the effects of reminders in the lives of informal caregivers, specifically in the Mindful Self-Care Scale subdomains. We found positive effects in the Supportive Relationships and the Mindful Relaxation subdomains with medium effects. Despite not being statistically significant, the Mindful Awareness and the Self-Compassion and Purpose subdomains have low enough p-values for us to argue that they may create positive effects if coupled with extra call-to-action features. This should be explored in future studies. The Supportive Structure subdomain seems to have no relation or be affected in any relevant way by the reminders.

Abstract With virtual reality (VR) industries and research focusing on gaming, training and, somewhat, in healthcare, there seems to be a lack of VR as simpler form of relaxing leisure, despite its potential. When emotions are targeted, there appears to be a focus on visceral ones like jump scares, panic, high adrenaline, fears and anything related to bad feelings and instinctive reactions. This study explores and proves that VR can effectively relax the user. We conducted an experiment where the users were exposed to VR-based natural sceneries, and we measured its effect on their positive feelings and relaxation levels. We found evidence, with a high degree of significance, of an increase in calmness and a reduction of arousal and energy. This effect is present in short sessions. We also explored the possibility of VR sunsets affecting our subjects’ circadian rhythm.

The usage of multimodal user interfaces has revolutionized many different activities. However, most of the interactive technologies deployed in real world engineering contexts are still difficult to use, especially when engineering teams need to collaboratively visualize and review large-scale 3D CAD (Computer-Aided Design) models. This is the case of the oil platform industry, which necessarily involves the review and manipulation of large CAD models. In this paper we present a novel solution, based on multitouch and accelerometer input, which was designed and evaluated in close cooperation with researchers and engineers of a large oil industry company. We evaluated two different conditions: using multitouch-only input and using multitouch coupled with accelerometer-based input. Statistical analysis of quantitative data suggests that the second condition is faster and less error-prone than simply using multitouch-only input. Additionally, qualitative data showed that users perceive the multitouch-only interface as being more accurate, but more difficult to understand and use.