arXiv subjects

Anna Jaskulska

Publications and source records attributed to Anna Jaskulska.

18 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Archiverse: an Approach for Immersive Cultural Heritage

Digital technologies and tools have transformed the way we can study cultural heritage and the way we can recreate it digitally. Techniques such as laser scanning, photogrammetry, and a variety of Mixed Reality solutions have enabled researchers to examine cultural objects and artifacts more precisely and from new perspectives. In this part of the panel, we explore how Virtual Reality (VR) and eXtended Reality (XR) can serve as tools to recreate and visualize the remains of historical cultural heritage and experience it in simulations of its original complexity, which means immersive and interactive. Visualization of material culture exemplified by archaeological sites and architecture can be particularly useful when only ruins or archaeological remains survive. However, these advancements also bring significant challenges, especially in the area of transdisciplinary cooperation between specialists from many, often distant, fields, and the dissemination of virtual immersive environments among both professionals and the general public.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2025

IoT and Older Adults: Towards Multimodal EMG and AI-Based Interaction with Smart Home

We report preliminary insights from an exploratory study on non-standard non-invasive interfaces for Smart Home Technologies (SHT). This study is part of a broader research project on effective Smart Home ecosystem Sagacity that will target older adults, impaired persons, and other groups disadvantaged in the main technology discourse. Therefore, this research is in line with a long-term research framework of the HASE research group (Human Aspects in Science and Engineering) by the Living Lab Kobo. In our study, based on the prototype of the comprehensive SHT management system Sagacity, we investigated the potential of bioelectric signals, in particular EMG and EOG as a complementary interface for SHT. Based on our previous participatory research and studies on multimodal interfaces, including VUI and BCI, we prepared an in-depth interactive hands-on experience workshops with direct involvement of various groups of potential end users, including older adults and impaired persons (total 18 subjects) to explore and investigate the potential of solutions based on this type of non-standard interfaces. The preliminary insights from the study unveil the potential of EMG/EOG interfaces in multimodal SHT management, alongside limitations and challenges stemming from the current state of technology and recommendations for designing multimodal interaction paradigms pinpointing areas of interest to pursue in further studies.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2023

Well-being in isolation: Exploring artistic immersive virtual environments in a simulated lunar habitat to alleviate asthenia symptoms

Revived interest in lunar and planetary exploration is heralding a new era for human spaceflight, characterized by frequent strain on astronaut's mental well-being, which stems from increased exposure to isolated, confined, and extreme (ICE) conditions. Whilst Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR) has been employed to facilitate self-help interventions to mitigate challenges caused by isolated environments in several domains, its applicability in support of future space expeditions remains largely unexplored. To address this limitation, we administered the use of distinct IVR environments to crew members (n=5) partaking in a simulated lunar habitat study. Utilizing a Bayesian approach to scrutinize small group data, we discovered a significant relationship between IVR usage and a reduction in perceived stress-related symptoms, particularly those associated with asthenia (syndrome often linked to chronic fatigue and weakness; a condition characterized by feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion that can be amplified in ICE conditions). The reductions were most prominent with the use of interactive virtual environments. The 'Aesthetic Realities' - virtual environments conceived as art exhibits - received exceptional praise from our participants. These environments mark a fascinating convergence of art and science, holding promise to mitigate effects related to isolation in spaceflight training and beyond.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2023

A Case for VR Briefings: Comparing Communication in Daily Audio and VR Mission Control in a Simulated Lunar Mission

Alpha-XR Mission conducted by XR Lab PJAIT focused on research related to individual and crew well-being and participatory team collaboration in ICE (isolated, confined and extreme) conditions. In this two-week mission within an analog space habitat, collaboration, objective execution and leisure was facilitated and studied by virtual reality (VR) tools. The mission commander and first officer, both experienced with virtual reality, took part in daily briefings with mission control. In the first week the briefings were voice-only conducted via a channel on Discord. During the following week last briefings were conducted in VR, using Horizon Workrooms. This qualitative pilot study employing participatory observation revealed that VR facilitates communication, especially on complex problems and experiences, providing the sense of emotional connection and shared understanding, that may be lacking in audio calls. The study points to the need to further explore VR-facilitated communication in high-stake environments as it may improve relationships, well-being, and communication outcomes.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2022

Interdisciplinary Research with Older Adults in the area of ICT: Selected Ethical Considerations and Challenges

In this paper we analyse, classify and discuss some ethical considerations and challenges related to pursuing exploratory and interdisciplinary research projects in the area of ICT, especially those involving older adults. First, we identify spotlight areas, which are especially prominent in these fields. Next, we explore possible pitfalls interdisciplinary researchers may stumble onto when planning, conducting and presenting exploratory research activities. Finally, some of these are selected and discussed more closely, while related open questions are posed.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2022

XR Hackathon Going Online: Lessons Learned from a Case Study with Goethe-Institut

In this article we report a case study of a Language and Culture-oriented transdisciplinary XR hackathon organized with Goethe-Institut. The hackathon was hosted as an online event in November 2020 by our University Lab in collaboration with Goethe-Institut as a follow-up to our previous co-organized event within our research group Living Lab. We have improved the formula of the event based on lessons learned from its previous edition. First, in one of the two hackathon tracks we provided the participants with a custom VR framework, to serve as a starting point for their designs to skip the repetitive early development stage. In cooperation with our partner, Goethe-Institut, we have also outlined best modern research-backed language-learning practices and methods and gathered them into actionable evaluation criteria.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2022

Participatory Action for Citizens' Engagement to Develop a Pro-Environmental Research Application

To understand and begin to address the challenge of air pollution in Europe we conducted participatory research, art and design activities with the residents of one of the areas most affected by smog in Poland. The participatory research events, described in detail in this article, centered around the theme of ecology and served to design an application that would allow us to conduct field research on pro-environmental behaviours at a larger scale. As a result we developed a research application, rooted in local culture and history and place attachment, which makes use of gamification techniques. The application gathers air quality data from the densest network of air pollution sensors in Europe, thereby aligning the visible signs of pollution in the app with the local sensor data. At the same time it reinforces the users' pro-environmental habits and exposes them to educational messages about air quality and the environment. The data gathered with this application will validate the efficacy of this kind of an intervention in addressing residents' smog-causing behaviours.

cs.CY↗

arXiv2022

Participatory Design Landscape for the Human-Machine Collaboration, Interaction and Automation at the Frontiers of HCI (PDL 2021)

We propose a one-day transdisciplinary creative workshop in the broad area of HCI focused on multiple opportunities of incorporating participatory design into research and industry practice. This workshop will become a venue to share experiences and novel ideas in this area. At the same time, we will brainstorm and explore frontiers of HCI related to engaging end users in design and development practices of established and emerging ICT solutions often overlooked in terms of co-design. We welcome a wide scope of contributions in HCI which explore sustainable opportunities for participatory design and development practices in the context of interconnected business, social, economic and environmental issues. The contributions ought to explore challenges and opportunities related to co-design at the frontiers of HCI - participatory design of newest and complex technologies, not easily explainable or intuitive, novel collaborative (remote or distributed) approaches to empowering users to prepare them to contribute as well as to engaging them directly in co-design.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2022

Older Adults' Motivation and Engagement with Diverse Crowdsourcing Citizen Science Tasks

In this exploratory study we evaluated the engagement, performance and preferences of older adults who interacted with different citizen science tasks. Out of 40 projects recently active on the Zooniverse platform we selected top ones to be represented by 8 diverse, yet standardized, microtasks, 2 in each category of image, audio, text and pattern recognition. Next, 33 older adults performed these microtasks at home and evaluated each task right after its completion to, finally, share what could encourage them to engage with such tasks in their free time. Based on the results we draw preliminary conclusions regarding older adults' motivations for engaging with such crowdsourcing tasks and suggest some guidelines for task design while discussing interesting avenues for further inquiry in the area of crowdsourcing for older adults.

cs.CY↗

arXiv2021

All Factors Should Matter! Reference Checklist for Describing Research Conditions in Pursuit of Comparable IVR Experiments

A significant problem with immersive virtual reality (IVR) experiments is the ability to compare research conditions. VR kits and IVR environments are complex and diverse but researchers from different fields, e.g. ICT, psychology, or marketing, often neglect to describe them with a level of detail sufficient to situate their research on the IVR landscape. Careful reporting of these conditions may increase the applicability of research results and their impact on the shared body of knowledge on HCI and IVR. Based on literature review, our experience, practice and a synthesis of key IVR factors, in this article we present a reference checklist for describing research conditions of IVR experiments. Including these in publications will contribute to the comparability of IVR research and help other researchers decide to what extent reported results are relevant to their own research goals. The compiled checklist is a ready-to-use reference tool and takes into account key hardware, software and human factors as well as diverse factors connected to visual, audio, tactile, and other aspects of interaction.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2021

VR Hackathon with Goethe Institute: Lessons Learned from Organizing a Transdisciplinary VR Hackathon

In this article we report a case study of a Language Learning Bauhaus VR hackathon with Goethe Institute. It was organized as an educational and research project to tap into the dynamics of transdisciplinary teams challenged with a specific requirement. In our case, it was to build a Bauhaus-themed German Language Learning VR App. We constructed this experiment to simulate how representatives of different disciplines may work together towards a very specific purpose under time pressure. So, each participating team consisted of members of various expert-fields: software development (Unity or Unreal), design, psychology and linguistics. The results of this study cast light on the recommended cycle of design thinking and customer-centered design in VR. Especially in interdisciplinary rapid prototyping conditions, where stakeholders initially do not share competences. They also showcase educational benefits of working in transdisciplinary environments. This study, combined with our previous work on human factors in rapid software development and co-design, including hackathon dynamics, allowed us to formulate recommendations for organizing content creation VR hackathons for specific purposes. We also provide guidelines on how to prepare the participants to work in rapid prototyping VR environments and benefit from such experiences in the long term.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2021

Older Adults and Brain-Computer Interface: An Exploratory Study

In this exploratory study, we examine the possibilities of non-invasive Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) in the context of Smart Home Technology (SHT) targeted at older adults. During two workshops, one stationary, and one online via Zoom, we researched the insights of the end users concerning the potential of the BCI in the SHT setting. We explored its advantages and drawbacks, and the features older adults see as vital as well as the ones that they would benefit from. Apart from evaluating the participants' perception of such devices during the two workshops we also analyzed some key considerations resulting from the insights gathered during the workshops, such as potential barriers, ways to mitigate them, strengths and opportunities connected to BCI. These may be useful for designing BCI interaction paradigms and pinpointing areas of interest to pursue in further studies.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2021

Deploying Crowdsourcing for Workflow Driven Business Process

The main goal of this paper is to discuss how to integrate the possibilities of crowdsourcing platforms with systems supporting workflow to enable the engagement and interaction with business tasks of a wider group of people. Thus, this work is an attempt to expand the functional capabilities of typical business systems by allowing selected process tasks to be performed by unlimited human resources. Opening business tasks to crowdsourcing, within established Business Process Management Systems (BPMS) will improve the flexibility of company processes and allow for lower work-load and greater specialization among the staff employed on-site. The presented conceptual work is based on the current international standards in this field, promoted by Workflows Management Coalition. To this end, the functioning of business platforms was analysed and their functionality was presented visually, followed by a proposal and a discussion of how to implement crowdsourcing into workflow systems.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2020

Exploration of Voice User Interfaces for Older Adults - A Pilot Study to Address Progressive Vision Loss

Voice User Interfaces (VUIs) owing to recent developments in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Natural Language Processing (NLP), are becoming increasingly intuitive and functional. They are especially promising for older adults, also with special needs, as VUIs remove some barriers related to access to Information and Communications Technology (ICT) solutions. In this pilot study we examine interdisciplinary opportunities in the area of VUIs as assistive technologies, based on an exploratory study with older adults, and a follow-up in-depth pilot study with two participants regarding the needs of people who are gradually losing their sight at a later age.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2019

VR with Older Adults: Participatory Design of a Virtual ATM Training Simulation

In this paper we report on a study conducted with a group of older adults in which they engaged in participatory design workshops to create a VR ATM training simulation. Based on observation, recordings and the developed VR application we present the results of the workshops and offer considerations and recommendations for organizing opportunities for end users, in this case older adults, to directly engage in co-creation of cutting-edge ICT solutions. These include co-designing interfaces and interaction schemes for emerging technologies like VR and AR. We discuss such aspects as user engagement and hardware and software tools suitable for participatory prototyping of VR applications. Finally, we present ideas for further research in the area of VR participatory prototyping with users of various proficiency levels, taking steps towards developing a unified framework for co-design in AR and VR.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2019

Older Adults and Voice Interaction: A Pilot Study with Google Home

In this paper we present the results of an exploratory study examining the potential of voice assistants (VA) for some groups of older adults in the context of Smart Home Technology (SHT). To research the aspect of older adults' interaction with voice user interfaces (VUI) we organized two workshops and gathered insights concerning possible benefits and barriers to the use of VA combined with SHT by older adults. Apart from evaluating the participants' interaction with the devices during the two workshops we also discuss some improvements to the VA interaction paradigm.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2018

Hybrid Approach to Automation, RPA and Machine Learning: a Method for the Human-centered Design of Software Robots

One of the more prominent trends within Industry 4.0 is the drive to employ Robotic Process Automation (RPA), especially as one of the elements of the Lean approach. The full implementation of RPA is riddled with challenges relating both to the reality of everyday business operations, from SMEs to SSCs and beyond, and the social effects of the changing job market. To successfully address these points there is a need to develop a solution that would adjust to the existing business operations and at the same time lower the negative social impact of the automation process. To achieve these goals we propose a hybrid, human-centered approach to the development of software robots. This design and implementation method combines the Living Lab approach with empowerment through participatory design to kick-start the co-development and co-maintenance of hybrid software robots which, supported by variety of AI methods and tools, including interactive and collaborative ML in the cloud, transform menial job posts into higher-skilled positions, allowing former employees to stay on as robot co-designers and maintainers, i.e. as co-programmers who supervise the machine learning processes with the use of tailored high-level RPA Domain Specific Languages (DSLs) to adjust the functioning of the robots and maintain operational flexibility.

cs.SE↗

arXiv2017

LivingLab PJAIT: Towards Better Urban Participation of Seniors

In this paper we provide a brief summary of development LivingLab PJAIT as an attempt to establish a comprehensive and sustainable ICT-based solution for empowerment of elderly communities towards better urban participation of seniors. We report on our various endeavors for better involvement and participation of older adults in urban life by lowering ICT barriers, encouraging social inclusion, intergenerational interaction, physical activity and engaging older adults in the process of development of ICT solutions. We report on a model and assumptions of the LivingLab PJAIT as well as a number of activities created and implemented for LivingLab participants: from ICT courses, both traditional and e-learning, through on-line crowdsourcing tasks, to blended activities of different forms and complexity. We also provide conclusions on the lessons learned in the process and some future plans, including solutions for better senior urban participation and citizen science.

cs.CY↗