Designers have grown increasingly interested in social consequences of new technologies. As social impacts become increasingly important it might be fruitful to understand how social impacts develop and how a designer can anticipate these consequences. In health care practices, for instance, it is important to control unintended social impacts at forehand. Social impact is an outcome of the mediating effect of a technology with its social environment. Human behaviour in a social environment can be analysed from the perspective of a social ecological system. To anticipate social impacts simulations of social practices are needed. To simulate practices the persona approach has been adapted to a screenplay approach in which the elements of a social ecology are used to gain a rich description of a social environment. This has been applied for a 'Heart Managers' case. It was concluded that the screenplay approach can be used for a systematic simulation of future social impacts.
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A social media architect is an appealing new profession that entails crossovers between communication and IT & Design. There are no study programmes for this job. Important questions are how to interest secondary school pupils for such a new job, and how to prepare them for these jobs or jobs that do not even exist today? This research aims to set an example by presenting a realistic job profile of a social media architect by linking the ‘21st century skills’ to the context in which he/she operates.
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We need look no further than the use of email communication, mobile phones and cars to understand that technology has wide-ranging social consequences. What is more, designers are plainly not always aware of the social consequences of technology, despite practicing user-centred design. Email, for instance, was developed as an efficient mode of communication between two actors. As we all know, the introduction of email has fundamentally changed traditional business and office practices. These side effects were not identified until long after email was introduced. During recent years, designers have grown increasingly interested in these social aspects. Modern information technology, in particular, creates extensive possibilities to influence social behaviour. Persuasive technology has been developed to increase, e.g., environmental friendliness. Once a designer aims at defined social changes, the consequences of technology for practices become a responsibility, too. The present research is aimed at providing tools and methods to anticipate social consequences at an earlier stage of the design process. These consequences of technologies in social environments will be called social impacts. In order to be a meaningful concept for designers the characteristics of a particular technology that are responsible for social impacts must be identified. Social consequences of technologies have not been observed very thoroughly from a user-centred design point of view. Therefore, this thesis is aimed, not only at gaining knowledge about social impact, but also translating these insights into workable instruments for designers. This leads to the following research questions:1. What relations can be identified between social impacts and characteristics oftechnologies?2. How can a designer anticipate social impact?3. How can social impact be managed in design environments?
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The focus of this project is on improving the resilience of hospitality Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) by enabling them to take advantage of digitalization tools and data analytics in particular. Hospitality SMEs play an important role in their local community but are vulnerable to shifts in demand. Due to a lack of resources (time, finance, and sometimes knowledge), they do not have sufficient access to data analytics tools that are typically available to larger organizations. The purpose of this project is therefore to develop a prototype infrastructure or ecosystem showcasing how Dutch hospitality SMEs can develop their data analytic capability in such a way that they increase their resilience to shifts in demand. The one year exploration period will be used to assess the feasibility of such an infrastructure and will address technological aspects (e.g. kind of technological platform), process aspects (e.g. prerequisites for collaboration such as confidentiality and safety of data), knowledge aspects (e.g. what knowledge of data analytics do SMEs need and through what medium), and organizational aspects (what kind of cooperation form is necessary and how should it be financed).Societal issueIn the Netherlands, hospitality SMEs such as hotels play an important role in local communities, providing employment opportunities, supporting financially or otherwise local social activities and sports teams (Panteia, 2023). Nevertheless, due to their high fixed cost / low variable business model, hospitality SMEs are vulnerable to shifts in consumer demand (Kokkinou, Mitas, et al., 2023; Koninklijke Horeca Nederland, 2023). This risk could be partially mitigated by using data analytics, to gain visibility over demand, and make data-driven decisions regarding allocation of marketing resources, pricing, procurement, etc…. However, this requires investments in technology, processes, and training that are oftentimes (financially) inaccessible to these small SMEs.Benefit for societyThe proposed study touches upon several key enabling technologies First, key enabling technology participation and co-creation lies at the center of this proposal. The premise is that regional hospitality SMEs can achieve more by combining their knowledge and resources. The proposed project therefore aims to give diverse stakeholders the means and opportunity to collaborate, learn from each other, and work together on a prototype collaboration. The proposed study thereby also contributes to developing knowledge with and for entrepreneurs and to digitalization of the tourism and hospitality sector.Collaborative partnersHZ University of Applied Sciences, Hotel Hulst, Hotel/Restaurant de Belgische Loodsensociëteit, Hotel Zilt, DM Hotels, Hotel Charley's, Juyo Analytics, Impuls Zeeland.
Due to societal developments, like the introduction of the ‘civil society’, policy stimulating longer living at home and the separation of housing and care, the housing situation of older citizens is a relevant and pressing issue for housing-, governance- and care organizations. The current situation of living with care already benefits from technological advancement. The wide application of technology especially in care homes brings the emergence of a new source of information that becomes invaluable in order to understand how the smart urban environment affects the health of older people. The goal of this proposal is to develop an approach for designing smart neighborhoods, in order to assist and engage older adults living there. This approach will be applied to a neighborhood in Aalst-Waalre which will be developed into a living lab. The research will involve: (1) Insight into social-spatial factors underlying a smart neighborhood; (2) Identifying governance and organizational context; (3) Identifying needs and preferences of the (future) inhabitant; (4) Matching needs & preferences to potential socio-techno-spatial solutions. A mixed methods approach fusing quantitative and qualitative methods towards understanding the impacts of smart environment will be investigated. After 12 months, employing several concepts of urban computing, such as pattern recognition and predictive modelling , using the focus groups from the different organizations as well as primary end-users, and exploring how physiological data can be embedded in data-driven strategies for the enhancement of active ageing in this neighborhood will result in design solutions and strategies for a more care-friendly neighborhood.
Anne4Care is een virtuele assistent ontwikkeld door Virtual Assistant BV. Zij biedt ondersteuning aan mensen met cognitieve problemen bij het behouden van dagstructuur, het onderhouden van sociale contacten en uitvoeren van betekenisvolle dagactiviteiten. De instructiematerialen zijn in de Nederlandse taal beschikbaar en gericht op gebruikers met een Nederlandse achtergrond. Anne4Care wordt op dit moment geïmplementeerd bij een dagbesteding van IMEAN Care in Almelo voor migrantenouderen. IT-professionals van Anne4Care en de zorgprofessionals van de dagbesteding van IMEAN hebben behoefte aan instructiematerialen en leermethoden die aansluiten op de behoeften van de groep migrantenouderen. Met als doel de introductie, acceptatie en het gebruik van Anne4Care zo optimaal mogelijk te laten verlopen. Dit zal resulteren in een betere ondersteuning van migrantenouderen en daarmee sociale inclusie en zinvolle dagbesteding bevorderen. Het consortium bestaat uit mbk-partners IMEAN Care (praktijk) en Virtual Assistant BV (technologieontwikkelaar) en de lectoraten Technology, Health & Care en Verpleegkunde van hogeschool Saxion. Samen met eindgebruikers (migrantenouderenouderen, hun mantelzorgers en zorgprofessionals) worden instructiematerialen en leermethoden ontwikkeld voor het gebruik van Anne4Care. Op basis van (1) observationeel en (2) literatuuronderzoek wordt een programma van eisen opgesteld. Vervolgens worden in co-creatie met eindgebruikers de instructiematerialen en leermethoden ontwikkeld en geëvalueerd. Tot slot zal virtuele assistent Anne4Care zelf een rol krijgen als instructrice waarbij een onboarding faciliteit wordt gecreëerd. De resultaten van dit project zijn: - Programma van eisen waaraan de instructiematerialen en leermethoden aan moeten voldoen - Instructiematerialen en leermethoden passend bij de wensen en behoeften van migrantenouderen, hun mantelzorgers en zorgprofessionals - Onboarding faciliteit op de tablet: Anne4Care als ‘instructrice’ in eigen (Turkse) taal - Inzicht in het gebruik en het gemak van Anne4Care en de instructiematerialen - Inzicht in de invloed van de instructiematerialen en leermethoden op het gebruik van Anne4Care.
