Designing Technologies with Older Adults: Ethical Tensions and Opportunities

Abstract

In this chapter, we reflect on our experiences of designing and evaluating new technologies with older adults. We describe encounters from two projects that have prompted us to reconsider our research in two ways. First, we highlight ethical tensions: situations where we have had to adapt our research approach to account for unexpected ethical challenges that emerged in specific situations with older participants. Second, we note how collaborating with older adults brings a wealth of ethical opportunities: older participants often challenge simplistic technological solutions to complex problems and help us question and critique the values and ethics embedded in the technologies we set out to..