What Is Privacy? Perceptions of Older Adults in the South of Spain About the Concept of Privacy and in Terms of Video-Based AAL Technologies

Abstract

Privacy is a very complex concept that concerns all areas of human activity. Even more so, it has acquired whole new importance and has become a hot-button topic in the era of ubiquitous computing. The emergence of Active and Assisted Living (AAL) technologies is offering the improvement of the quality of life and maintaining the independence of older adults in their preferred environment. Especially with the advancement of computer vision, video-based technological solutions are giving us promising results but bring along significant risks of privacy violation. With this qualitative study, we aim to explore older adults’ understanding of privacy as a construct and their privacy considerations for technology-based monitoring applications in eldercare, for video-based systems among them. Exploratory interview sessions were conducted with 12 older adults 66 and plus of age living in care homes and in private households. Findings indicate that the concept of privacy is indeed difficult to understand and define for older adults. However, the context of video monitoring elicits clear privacy concerns. The nudity aspect of privacy was proved to be the most important among the participants, yet, the attitudinal shift in the perception of nudity was observed in older adults living in care homes. Eight out of 12 interviewed older adults did not like the idea of having a camera-based assistive technology, however, some of their worries were alleviated after explaining to them the possible technology’s inherent privacy-preserving techniques.