ijerph-logo

Journal Browser

Journal Browser

Enhancing Quality of Life and Health with ICT

A special issue of International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (ISSN 1660-4601). This special issue belongs to the section "Digital Health".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 February 2023) | Viewed by 17750

Special Issue Editors

Department of Informatics, Umeå University, 901 87 Umeå, Sweden
Interests: HCI and user psychology; ICT for successful ageing; ICT and health
Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S, Canada
Interests: human factors; aging technologies; user interface design; healthcare ergonomics; social computing

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is an increasingly important component of modern society, touching almost every aspect of our lives. It is used for applications such as communication, entertainment, sensing and control, and in a wide variety of setting such as homes, cars, workplaces and public spaces. ICT-based transformations are generally positive, but can have negative impacts on quality of life and health. Examples include the overuse of social media and other applications, leading to disturbed sleep, low self-esteem in the young, and a sense of isolation from current social channels in the elderly. However, ICT can also be used in ways that specifically safeguard or enhance health, for example, through sensor-based intelligent systems that monitor health, diagnose disease, or encourage more healthy lifestyles and greater exercise, leading to an improved quality of life.

For this Special Issue, we are seeking contributions that address ways in which ICT can be designed and applied to help maintain and enhance quality of life and health, including both physical and mental wellbeing. Examples include, but are not limited to, the design and use of ICT to:

  • enhance personal safety and a sense of security;
  • provide mental and physical exercise programs to maintain health;
  • encourage healthy eating and lifestyle patterns;
  • overcome mental health issues such as depression, phobias, and eating disorders;
  • provide experiences that aid meditation, relaxation, revitalization and recuperation;
  • monitor and provide feedback on personal health parameters;
  • increase social interaction and participation to help combat isolation and loneliness;
  • mitigate or reverse the negative impact of other ICTs.

We are interested in cases highlighting innovative ways of deploying new and existing technologies in realistic settings, for these and other related areas of application. Contributions that include empirical measures of effectiveness and impacts on users’ lives are particularly welcome. More theoretical approaches to the design of health-enhancing technologies are also sought, as are review articles covering specific areas and aims of use relevant to addressing quality of life and health with ICT.

Prof. Dr. John Waterworth
Prof. Dr. Mark Chignell
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2500 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • ICT and health
  • quality of life
  • health apps
  • exergames
  • HCI design
  • personalized health
  • social networking
  • technologies for aging well
  • mental health apps
  • serious games

Published Papers (5 papers)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

Jump to: Review

10 pages, 804 KiB  
Article
Voice Assistants as Consultants for Male Patients with Sexual Dysfunction: A Reliable Option?
by Luigi Napolitano, Biagio Barone, Lorenzo Spirito, Francesco Trama, Savio Domenico Pandolfo, Marco Capece, Esther García-Rojo, Esaú Fernández-Pascual, Felice Crocetto, Ferdinando Fusco, Marco De Sio, Davide Arcaniolo and Celeste Manfredi
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20(3), 2612; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijerph20032612 - 01 Feb 2023
Viewed by 1397
Abstract
The aim of this study was to evaluate the ability of Google Assistant, Alexa, and Siri to recognize and answer questions about male sexual health. Each VA was tested on a smart speaker: Alexa on Amazon Echo Dot 4th Gen., Google Assistant on [...] Read more.
The aim of this study was to evaluate the ability of Google Assistant, Alexa, and Siri to recognize and answer questions about male sexual health. Each VA was tested on a smart speaker: Alexa on Amazon Echo Dot 4th Gen., Google Assistant on Google Home Mini, and Siri on Apple HomePod. A pool of patients’ frequently asked questions regarding erectile dysfunction (ED), premature ejaculation (PE), Peyronie’s disease (PD), male infertility, and other aspects of male sexual health were identified by authors. The recognition of question was evaluated (“yes” or “not”). For each recognized question, the response characteristics (domains) were rated on a scale from 0 to 10 (according to the quality). We chose the recognition rate of the questions as the primary outcome and the quality of the answers as the secondary outcome. Overall, the best VA in recognizing questions was Siri, with a total of 83.3% questions compared with 64.0% for Alexa (p = 0.024) and 74.0% for Google Assistant (p = 0.061). Siri was associated with a significantly higher recognition rate than Alexa for PE (80% vs. 40%; p = 0.002) and PD (66.7% vs. 33.3%; p = 0.010). The quality of the responses was classified as low in 57 out of 105 cases (54.3%), intermediate in 46 cases (43.8%), and high in only 2 cases (1.9%), highlighting an overall intermediate-low quality of the answers. Male infertility was the condition associated with the highest mean scores in “Targeted response to the problem” (7.32 ± 2.57), “Scientific correctness of the answer”, (5.9 ± 2.76) “Completeness of the answer” (5.14 ± 2.56), and “Understandability of the response for a patient” (5.3 ± 2.51) domains. Siri was associated with significantly higher scores than Alexa (p < 0.05) in several domains of all conditions evaluated. The question recognition rate of VAs is quite high; however, the quality of the answers is still intermediate-low. Siri seems superior to Alexa in both question recognition and response quality. Male infertility appears to be the sexual dysfunction best addressed by VAs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Enhancing Quality of Life and Health with ICT)
Show Figures

Figure 1

12 pages, 650 KiB  
Article
Is Fitspiration the Healthy Internet Trend It Claims to Be? A British Students’ Case Study
by Maria Limniou, Charlotte Mahoney and Megan Knox
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2021, 18(4), 1837; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijerph18041837 - 13 Feb 2021
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 5675
Abstract
The increasingly popular #fitspiration community on Instagram aims to promote body positivity and inspire health in its followers. However, fitspiration accounts often endorse unattainable, overly fit body ideals. The aim of this study is to explore the effects of viewing fitspiration photos on [...] Read more.
The increasingly popular #fitspiration community on Instagram aims to promote body positivity and inspire health in its followers. However, fitspiration accounts often endorse unattainable, overly fit body ideals. The aim of this study is to explore the effects of viewing fitspiration photos on body image and fit-ideal internalisation. We compared 109 British students’ (18–50 years-old) responses on state self-esteem, mood satisfaction, body satisfaction and fit-ideal internalisation before and after viewing fitspiration photos. Online questionnaires exposed students to either five male or five female fitspiration photos, respectively for their given gender. Photos were sourced from public Instagram accounts. This study also examined the influence age and Instagram usage have on body image. Exposure to fitspiration photos produced a significant reduction in state self-esteem, mood satisfaction and fit-ideal internalisation, but had no significant influence on body satisfaction. Age had no effect on body image; however, gender impacted mood satisfaction and fit-ideal internalisation. Instagram usage influenced fit-ideal internalisation, with specific Instagram factors, such as how the importance of a photo’s “likes” were negatively associated with state self-esteem, mood and body satisfaction. Unexpectedly, Instagram frequency use and posting were related to higher levels of state self-esteem. Detailed explanations of the findings and potential future research opportunities are also discussed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Enhancing Quality of Life and Health with ICT)
Show Figures

Figure 1

Review

Jump to: Research

21 pages, 6148 KiB  
Review
Virtual Reality for Addressing Depression and Anxiety: A Bibliometric Analysis
by Nuru Jingili, Solomon Sunday Oyelere, Frank Ojwang, Friday Joseph Agbo and Markus B. T. Nyström
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20(9), 5621; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijerph20095621 - 24 Apr 2023
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2875
Abstract
Virtual reality is an emerging field in mental health and has gained widespread acceptance due to its potential to treat various disorders, such as anxiety and depression. This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of virtual reality (VR) use in addressing depression and anxiety [...] Read more.
Virtual reality is an emerging field in mental health and has gained widespread acceptance due to its potential to treat various disorders, such as anxiety and depression. This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of virtual reality (VR) use in addressing depression and anxiety from 1995 to 2022. The study analysed 1872 documents using the Scopus database, identifying the field’s most relevant journals and authors. The results indicate that using VR for addressing anxiety and depression is a multidisciplinary field with a wide variety of research topics, leading to significant collaborative research in this area. The Annual Review of Cybertherapy and Telemedicine was identified as the most relevant journal, while Behavior Research and Therapy was found to be the most cited journal. The analysis of keywords suggests that there is more research on using VR for anxiety and related disorders than for depression. Riva G. was identified as the top author in producing research outputs on VR-AD, and the University of Washington emerged as the leading institution in scientific outputs on VR-AD. Thematic and intellectual analyses helped identify the main themes within the research domain, providing valuable insight into the current and future directions of the field. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Enhancing Quality of Life and Health with ICT)
Show Figures

Figure 1

20 pages, 1098 KiB  
Review
Leveraging Reddit for Suicidal Ideation Detection: A Review of Machine Learning and Natural Language Processing Techniques
by Eldar Yeskuatov, Sook-Ling Chua and Lee Kien Foo
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(16), 10347; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijerph191610347 - 19 Aug 2022
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 4275
Abstract
Suicide is a major public-health problem that exists in virtually every part of the world. Hundreds of thousands of people commit suicide every year. The early detection of suicidal ideation is critical for suicide prevention. However, there are challenges associated with conventional suicide-risk [...] Read more.
Suicide is a major public-health problem that exists in virtually every part of the world. Hundreds of thousands of people commit suicide every year. The early detection of suicidal ideation is critical for suicide prevention. However, there are challenges associated with conventional suicide-risk screening methods. At the same time, individuals contemplating suicide are increasingly turning to social media and online forums, such as Reddit, to express their feelings and share their struggles with suicidal thoughts. This prompted research that applies machine learning and natural language processing techniques to detect suicidality among social media and forum users. The objective of this paper is to investigate methods employed to detect suicidal ideations on the Reddit forum. To achieve this objective, we conducted a literature review of the recent articles detailing machine learning and natural language processing techniques applied to Reddit data to detect the presence of suicidal ideations. Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines, we selected 26 recent studies, published between 2018 and 2022. The findings of the review outline the prevalent methods of data collection, data annotation, data preprocessing, feature engineering, model development, and evaluation. Furthermore, we present several Reddit-based datasets utilized to construct suicidal ideation detection models. Finally, we conclude by discussing the current limitations and future directions in the research of suicidal ideation detection. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Enhancing Quality of Life and Health with ICT)
Show Figures

Figure 1

19 pages, 1668 KiB  
Review
Use of Blockchain Technology in the Domain of Physical Exercise, Physical Activity, Sport, and Active Ageing: A Systematic Review
by Juan Lopez-Barreiro, Luis Alvarez-Sabucedo, Jose Luis Garcia-Soidan and Juan M. Santos-Gago
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(13), 8129; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/ijerph19138129 - 02 Jul 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2345
Abstract
Blockchain technology provides a distributed support for information storage and traceability. Recently, it has been booming in a wide variety of domains: finance, food, energy, and health. In the field of physical activity, physical exercise, sport, and active ageing, this technology could also [...] Read more.
Blockchain technology provides a distributed support for information storage and traceability. Recently, it has been booming in a wide variety of domains: finance, food, energy, and health. In the field of physical activity, physical exercise, sport, and active ageing, this technology could also originate some interesting services introducing support for reliable repository of results, for gamification, or for secure data interchange. This systematic review explores the use of blockchain in this context. The objective is to determine to which extent this technology has fulfilled the potential of blockchain to bring these new added-value services. The authors explored 5 repositories in search of papers describing solutions applied to the above-mentioned frame. 17 papers were selected for full-text analysis, and they displayed diverse applications of blockchain, such as Fitness and healthcare, Sport, and Active ageing. A detailed analysis shows that the solutions found do not leverage all the possibilities of blockchain technology. Most of the solutions analyzed use blockchain for managing, sharing, and controlling access to data and do not exploit the possibilities of Smart Contracts or oracles. Additionally, the advantages of the blockchain model have not been fully exploited to engage users using approaches such as gamification. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Enhancing Quality of Life and Health with ICT)
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop