title: Immersive technology and the elderly: a mini-review.
abstract: Technologies that provide immersive experiences continue to become more ubiquitous across all age groups. This paper presents a review of the literature to provide a snapshot of the current state of research involving the use of immersive technologies and the elderly. A narrative literature review was conducted using the ScienceDirect, EBSCOhost, Springerlink and ERIC databases to summarize primary studies from which conclusions were drawn into a holistic interpretation. The majority of the studies examined the effect of immersive technologies on elder peoples' age-related declines, including sensory and motor changes (vision, hearing, motor skills), cognitive changes and social changes. Various immersive technologies have been described and tested to address these age-related changes, and have been categorized as 'games and simulations', 'robotics' and 'social technologies'. In most cases, promising results were found for immersive technologies to challenge age-related declines, especially through the increase of morale.
authors.affiliation: Department of Educational Technology, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho, USA.
authors.forename: Brett E
authors.initials: BE
authors.lastname: Shelton
authors.forename: Cigdem
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Uz
mesh_terms: D000203:Activities of Daily Living / Q000523:psychology*; D000223:Adaptation, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology; D003197:Computer Literacy; D006801:Humans; D010353:Patient Education as Topic / Q000379:methods*; D012656:Self-Help Devices / Q000523:psychology*