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VIRTUAL REALITY IN KEEPING SENIORS ACTIVE: �VIREAS PROJECT

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TECHNOLOGIES FOR ACTIVE AND INDEPENDENT LIVING IN OLD AGE�FEBRUARY 10-11, 2021

Mgr. Věra Suchomelová, Th.D.

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The project TL02000344 Virtual reality in keeping the Elderly active is solved with the financial support of TA CR

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Overview

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  • Interdisciplinary project�VIREAS: Virtual reality �in keeping seniors active
  • Main results of a pilot study �in a nursing home

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Virtual Reality as a tool for �keeping the elderly active

Key features of VR

for this use:

    • Immersiveness (the feeling of being inside the story)
    • Interactivity (the possibility to actively influence the storyline)

Limits/risks

    • Improper content or form of the experience
    • Motion sickness
    • Confusion
    • A headset used like�a senior „baby sitter“

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Virtual Reality in keeping �seniors active: two main results

�Set of virtual experiences

    • Three virtual environments
    • Meeting the various needs of old age: the need for dignity and self-value, meaning and continuity of one´s life story, the need for beauty etc.

Conceptual manual �for activity coordinators

    • Overview of the technology
    • Interaction with senior before, during and after the VR session
    • How to use VR experiences in other individual or group activities
    • Ethical frame of this use of VR

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What and how?

Forest

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    • Interactive walk through stylized „global“ forest
    • Fully animated scene�

Travel

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    • Partly interactive, fully animated train station
    • Gallery of 360° pictures of some destinations

City center

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    • Interactive walk through fully animated stylized town
    • A church with real 360° interior

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HOW? Reality, life and action, �easy controlling

Forest

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    • Reality: typical middle European plants

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    • Life and action: living and moving things (wind, animals, insects), elements of surprise,
    • Parallel assisted control

Travel

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    • Reality: more „Czech“ train station

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    • Life and action: typical sounds, a logical order of the 360° pictures, logical motion in the scene
    • Parallel assisted control

City center

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    • Reality: Interactive walk through real town

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    • Life and action: more people, youth and kids in the scene, possibility to enter buildings and shops
    • Parallel assisted control�

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Meaningfully using VR in � keeping seniors active:

  • a suitable spatial background in the facility
  • trained activity coordinators (facilitators)
  • impulses for the seniors’ everyday lives
  • support social interaction in the seniors’ real world
  • source of positive emotion, support one’s self-confidence, �self-esteem and dignity

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Thank you for your attention!

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Mgr. Věra Suchomelová Th.D.

email: suchomelova@tf.jcu.cz

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