http://www.mimos.it/nuovo/contenuto_view.asp?id=882

Testaluna presented the VERVE project at SERIGAMEX 2013, a workshop about serious games held in Rome, at VIGAMUS (Italian Museum of Videogames), on the 21st of March.

The audience, made of mainly professionals in the field of serious games, were presented with an overview of the project and its components, with a particular focus on Kitchen Scenario, our serious game created for helping patients suffering from Alzheimer disease.

Human Computer Confluence summer school 2013

Human computer confluence (HCC) refers to an invisible, implicit, embodied or even implanted interaction between humans and system components. New classes of user interfaces may evolve that make use of several sensors and are able to adapt their physical properties to the current situational context of users.

HCC originally emerged out of various European research initiatives aiming at fundamental and strategic research studying how the emerging symbiotic relation between humans and ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) can be based on radically new forms of sensing, perception, interaction and understanding.

The HCC summer school invites participants to understand the various technological aspects of our symbiosis with ICT, but also the impact of this confluence on society. It aims to share scientific knowledge and experience among participants, enhance and stimulate interdisciplinary dialogue as well as provide further opportunities for co-operation within the study domains of Human Computer Confluence.

This second HCC summer school will try to benefit most from the research interests and the special facilities of the IRCAM institute, the last as a place dedicated to the coupling of art with the sciences of sound and media.

Special focus will be:

• Musical interfaces
• Interactive sound design
• Sensorimotor learning and gesture-sound interactive systems
• Croud-sourcing and human computation approaches in artistic applications

The three-day summer school will include invited lectures by experts in the field, a round-table discussion and practical workshops. During the workshops, participants will engage in hands-on HCC group projects that they will present at the end of the summer school.

More information:

Date: 17th, 18th and 19th July 2013
Venue name: IRCAM ; http://www.ircam.fr
Location: Paris, France
Website: http://hcsquared.eu/summer-school-2013
The number of participants is limited to 40.

Application deadline: 17th April 2013 – The judging panel will inform the forty successful candidates by: 30th April 2013

Costs and scholarships: There is no registration fee for the Summer School. There will be a number of scholarships to attendees that are not Paris residents.

For more information, please visit the HCC Summer School website or contact hccschool-admin@ircam.fr

Workshop on Interactive Multimedia Technologies to Support Vulnerable People

Theme and Goals

The VERVE workshop seeks to generate dialogue and debate on the use of interactive multimedia technology to support vulnerable people in everyday environments. The workshop builds on the growing use of serious games in many aspects of modern life such as defence and education, and in particular its increasing use in healthcare settings. The intent of such technology is to improve the quality of life for disadvantaged groups including older people and those with neurological disorders, taking into account cognitive, emotional, and behavioural aspects of the person. Of particular interest is the use of serious games to help in everyday activities outside the home, for example when shopping or being in crowded situations. We are also interested in understanding the use of interactive multimedia technology to help those at risk of social exclusion, as well as their careers, families, health professionals and relevant support organisations, and to solicit ideas and feedback.

Topics of Interest

We invite papers about research in and application of interactive multimedia technologies that provide support to elderly or vulnerable people. Such tools could help sufferers from Parkinson’s disease, or those suffering from apathy related to cognitive decline and behavioural disturbances, for example due to Alzheimer’s disease. Although focusing on these areas initially, the workshop encourages submissions on the use of interactive multimedia technologies in a much wider range of healthcare settings. Topics addressed include:

• Technology acceptance by the elderly and those suffering from anxiety-related disorder
• Gaming technology as a therapeutic capability
• The use of virtual agents as assistants in health care and therapy
• The use of games to provide support and information to carers and family members
• Human computer confluences applied to health
• Technologies linked to pervasive computing, health science and human neuroscience
• Methods for measuring the effects and benefits of serious games in healthcare settings
• Use of game technology to develop physical and cognitive improvement in patients
• The use of gaming technology as a means of social inclusion for vulnerable adults

Important Dates

Paper Submission Deadline: March 01, 2013
Acceptance Notice: March 15, 2013

Workshop Chairs

Brian Gannon
b.gannon@kainos.com
Kainos and Birkbeck College,University of London

Catherine Pelachaud
catherine.pelachaud@telecom-paristech.fr
CNRS, Institut Mines Telecom – Telecom-ParisTech

Isabelle Viaud-Delmon
isabelle.viaud-delmon@ircam.fr
CNRS, IRCAM

Submission Information

Submissions should be in ACM style format and will be accepted as either full paper (8 pages) or short paper (4 pages). Please refer also to the conference submission guideline http://www.petrae.org/proceedings.php

Submissions are to be done through the workshop’s submissions page http://www.petrae.org/submissionlist.php

VERVE was also showcased at the first Joint World Congress of ISPGR (International Society for Posture & Gait Research) and Gait & Mental Function in Trondheim in June (www.ispgr.org/conferences/norway-2012/). Again, significant interest was shown in the programme, particularly on its focus on Freezing of Gait and Fear of Falling. VERVE’s aims were of great interest to many of the clinical attendees, who were excited to see such innovative and collaborative research.

Niamh Merriman, Caroline Whyatt, Annalisa Setti, Nicholas Gillian, William Young, Stuart Ferguson, Cathy Craig, Fiona Newell

Abstract

Although the vestibular system is involved in maintaining balance and posture control, recent studies have provided evidence for the crucial role of other sensory modalities in this task. In older adults, reduced visual capacity, specifically impaired depth perception and contrast sensitivity, has been associated with an increased risk of falls. Moreover, using the auditory-flash illusion (Shams et al., 2000) we recently reported that auditory-visual perception is less efficient in fall-prone older adults than in their age-matched counterparts (Setti et al., 2011) and that susceptibility increases with ageing. The aim of this study was to investigate whether balance training is associated with changes in how efficiently auditory and visual information is integrated in older adults. We tested 58 older (65+ years) adults, half of whom took part in a balance training intervention programme over a series of 5 weeks and half of whom were controls. Pre- and post-training measures of balance control (e.g. Berg Balance Scale) and movement-based signals (e.g. displacement of centre of pressure) across groups suggested that the intervention was successful in improving overall balance control. Furthermore, we found that susceptibility to the auditory-flash illusion did not increase for the intervention group, but did increase in the control group over time. Furthermore, following balance training our data suggest that audio-visual integration becomes relatively more efficient in fall-prone than in non-fall prone older adults. Our findings suggest important links between balance control and multisensory interactions in the ageing brain.

References

Setti, A., Burke, K. E., Kenny, R. A., & Newell, F. N. (2011). Is inefficient multisensory processing associated with falls in older people? Experimental brain research, 209 (3), 375-84.

Shams, L., Kamitani, Y., & Shimojo, S. (2000). What you see is what you hear. Nature, 408 (December), 788-788.

We recently reported that efficient multisensory integration is affected by the ageing process. Specifically, we found that older persons were more susceptible to the sound-induced flash illusion (Shams et al. 2000) than younger adults, even at relatively large stimulus onset asynchronies of more than 170 ms. Furthermore, susceptibility to this illusion increased with age (i.e. across individuals), and over time (i.e. over two years in the same individual). Our findings also suggest that inefficient multisensory integration is associated with balance maintenance and control: older persons with a history of falling were more susceptible to the sound-induced flash illusion than their age-matched counterparts (Setti et al. 2011a) and more illusions were reported in older adults during a standing than a seated position. Importantly, we found no differences in sensory acuity between older adults with and without a history of falls. We also found that during spatial navigation, older persons with a history of falling, relative to an age-matched cohort, failed to compensate for changes in their visual environment (full or blurred visual input) by adjusting their gait accordingly (Barrett et al. 2012). Our findings are suggestive of temporal interactions between the sensory systems in the brain (see e.g. Setti et al. 2011b), and not in the nature of the information encoded at the peripheral nervous system, which underpin efficient perception-to-action in an older adult.

References

Shams L, Kamitani Y, Shimojo S. (2000). Illusions. What you see is what you hear. Nature. 408(6814):788.

Setti A, Burke KE, Kenny RA, Newell FN. (2011a). Is inefficient multisensory processing associated with falls in older people? Exp Brain Res. 209(3):375-84.

Setti A, Finnigan S, Sobolewski R, McLaren L, Robertson IH, Reilly RB, Kenny RA, Newell FN. (2011b). Audiovisual temporal discrimination is less efficient with aging: an event-related potential study. Neuroreport, 22(11):554-8.

Barrett, M., Doheny, E. Setti, A., Maguinness, C., Foran, T.G., Kenny, RA & Newell, F.N. (2012). Reduced vision selectively impairs spatial updating during locomotion in fall prone older adults. Submitted.

The project will develop tools to support the treatment of people who are at risk of social exclusion due to fear and apathy associated with ageing or a neurological disorder. The VERVE consortium will apply leading edge research to simulate personalised and populated virtual reality (VR) environments, 3D web graphics, and ‘serious’ games as a means to addressing some of the challenges faced by the target groups. A variety of clinical, laboratory and industry partners will help design the therapeutic tools and games, and evaluate their usefulness with participants. The project team will also work with those at risk of social exclusion, as well as their carers, families, health professionals and relevant support organisations, to solicit ideas and feedback and to promote the project’s aims and achievements.

VERVE’s efforts will focus on three situations, each targeting a different group of participants: fear of falling and Parkinson’s disease; apathy related to cognitive decline and behavioural disturbances, in particular due to Alzheimer’s Disease; and other emotional disturbances linked to anxiety.

Although focusing on these areas initially, it is expected that the results of the research will be applicable to a much wider range of potentially disadvantaged individuals.

Commenting on the significance and aims of the project, Trinity College Dublin’s Professor of Visual Computing and VERVE project coordinator, Carol O’Sullivan says: “The end goal of the novel ICT technologies being developed in VERVE is to increase user ability, allowing older people and those with neurological disorders to overcome their fear, apathy or phobia and thus carry out daily life activities in a fulfilling and dignified manner. The key to our success will be the fact that the clinical intermediary users will be actively participating during the development of the ICT tools and platforms, and will thus guarantee that the end result will be usable and accepted by the end-users.“

The VERVE consortium partners are Trinity College Dublin (Ireland), Chu de Nice: The Central University Hospital of Nice; INRIA: Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et Automatique, and CNRS: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (France), Testaluna (Italy), Kainos (UK), Universidad de Zaragoza (Spain) and DFKI: Deutsches Forschungszentrum für Künstliche Intelligenz (Germany).