A single-user tabletop card game system for older persons: General lessons learned from an in-situ study

Abstract

This paper discusses some general results from an in-situ study of the use of a tabletop system for card playing that differs in several ways from most tabletop systems: 1. It was designed primarily for use by senior citizens with little or no computer experience. 2. It is a single-user system, though social interaction with nearby persons during its use is typical. 3. It includes a simple conversational agent (representing the gamepsilas other player). 4. It is used in a setting (a senior citizenspsila center) in which the users also play cards in the traditional ways. A total of 42 regular visitors of the center participated over a 4-week period. From our observations and results, we draw several conclusions that should apply to other tabletop systems that share one or more of the characteristics just listed.