Paul WatsonDirector SiDE

Director Digital InstituteProfessor of Computer Science

Newcastle University

Social Exclusion

Misery Loss of £Bs from economy

Social Inclusion

Digital Technologies

New Technologies

• New technologies have the potential to make a positive impact on excluded people

– Pervasive computing

– Cloud computing

– Mobile communications

• Our research aims to realise that potential

• £12M Research “Hub”

– Research Councils UK funded

– 1 of 3 UK Digital Economy Hubs

– 2009-2014

• Newcastle & Dundee Universities

• Working with many external groups

– public, private & 3rd sector

– Years Ahead a key partner

Project Structure

Activities

Accessibility Connected Home &

Community

Transport CreativeIndustries

Pe

rsp

ect

ive

s

Technology

Society

Business

Users

Multi - Disciplinary Team

• Professor Paul Watson, Computing Science & Digital Institute

• Professor Phil Blythe, Civil Engineering

• Professor Feng Li, Business School

• (Dr. Sally Jane Norman, Culture Lab)

• Professor Patrick Olivier, Computing Science & DI

• Ranald Richardson, Geography, Politics and Sociology

• Professor Atau Tanaka, Arts & Cultures

• Professor Aad van Moorsel, Computing Science

• Dr. Lynne Corner, Institute for Ageing and Health

Professor Patrick Olivier, Newcastle University

Can we use pervasive technologies to allow people to stay longer in their own homes?

Dementia

“Gets the kettle, fills it, switches it on…

but then she’ll stand there, and I’ll say –‘what are you doing now?’

and I’ve jogged her memory again…

she gets the coffee jar, and she’ll take the top off the jar. And she’ll look at it and think ‘what am I doing with this off for?”

Ambient Kitchen

Grand Challenge

How can we use real-time information to influence behaviour (for the good)?

Key Stages

Collect

Process

Influence

People

How to model and reason about behaviour?

How to influence behaviour?

Intervention

Sensors

What data to collect?

Influencing People with Dementia

Collect

Process

Influence

People

How to model and reason about behaviour?

How to influence behaviour?

Intervention

Sensors

What data to collect?

RFID Accelerometers in utensilsFloor pressureVideo

Data Mining,Activity Recognition,Partially Ordered Markov Decision Processes

Prompting,Alerts

Real Time Historic

App App App

Consumers

Consumers & Generators

App

Sensors

Generators

App

Data WarehouseEvent Processing

Our General Architecture

Inform

Create ModelsCalibrate ModelsAggregations

Filter

Sensor events→ Application events

SIDE Summary

• Digital Technology currently not benefitting all

• Our aim is to transform lives

– focus on research into harnessing new technologies

– to benefit the socially excluded

• Creating Centre of Excellence in Digital Inclusion

– multi-disciplinary team essential