With aging populations and rising health care costs, many high-income countries are exploring mobile computing technologies to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of health care provision. These technologies, which underpin the field of pervasive computing, introduce a new model of human–computer interaction. Instead of the scenario where a single user interacts with a desk-bound “personal” computer, pervasive computing envisions a world embedded with small, inexpensive, portable networked devices able to communicate seamlessly with each other. In common with resource-rich countries, the field of pervasive computing has the potential to promote and support healthy population development in middle and low-income countries, and this, therefore, has relevance for South Africa. Current estimates suggest that there are between 28 and 32 million mobile phones in South Africa. This means that around 60% of all South Africans own, or have access to, mobile telecommunication. Over 900 000 km2 of the country is covered by the GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication) network of Vodacom, the largest telecommunications company in the country. Over 90% of South Africa is provided with access to mobile connectivity through shared agreements between the country’s major telecommunications networks. Aims The ubiquity of mobile phones has resulted in their receiving increasing attention from public health researchers. Yet a better understanding of how mobile phones could support health research in South Africa is still an emerging field with many unanswered questions. This thesis attempts to fill some of these gaps in our current knowledge. In particular, the primary aim of this work is to implement and evaluate the use of mobile phones as instruments with which to collect and analyse information for monitoring, evaluation and research in low-resource rural African settings. Methods To investigate this aim, data were gathered from the development, implementation and evaluation of four health surveys in South Africa. Two surveys were conducted with Birth to Twenty, a birth cohort of South African young adults living in Greater Johannesburg. These data were used to better understand the feasibility and data-quality implications of using mobile phones as a tool for the administration of ‘self-administered’ surveys. Two additional surveys, completed in KwaZulu-Natal province, evaluated the same themes of feasibility, acceptability and impact of data quality in mobile-phone-assisted personal (face-to-face) interviews (MPAPI). The first, conducted with 500 HIV-positive pregnant women in eight primary health clinics and 12 interviewers trained to use the mobile-phone survey software, was used to assess the feasibility and acceptability of MPAPI. The final survey compared the difference in data quality achieved by 100 interviewers using either pen and paper, or mobile phones to conduct a short health survey. De Leeuw's conceptual model was used to frame how mode characteristics influence data quality. Results Mobile-phone-assisted interviewing was found to have an impact on the data quality, feasibility and acceptability of health surveys. MPAPI was found to be similar in terms of accuracy and cost to small-scale paper-and-pen interviewing (PAPI) surveys. Time lines and accessibility were improved by the use of MPAPI. Mobile-phone-assisted self-interviewing (MPASI) surveys were found to have a lower survey response but a higher item-completion rate. Acceptability was found to be moderated by technological familiarity and the use patterns of mobile-phone features. Finally, conducting health research using mobile-phone interviews in South Africa was found to be feasible; to reduce the loss of questionnaires, and photocopying and data-entry costs; and to improve the speed at which data becomes available for analysis. Factors that mediated feasibility included the technical expertise of the project management and field staff, the technological know-how of participants, the comprehensiveness of the interviewer training, the mobile communication channel used (e.g., handset-agnostic SMS) and the presence or absence of an interviewer. Conclusion Under the right conditions, mobile-phone-assisted interviewing appears to be a feasible and practical tool for the rapid collection of health information, with data accuracy being the same or better than pen-and-paper interviews. It is argued that these benefits increase as the scale of the survey increases. Improved data can positively influence population health by providing decision makers with more rapid access to accurate data with which to monitor large-scale health systems. Small projects that do not require the rapid availability of data or where staff do not have the appropriate technical proficiencies would be better suited at present to more traditional survey data-collection techniques. Keywords: mobile phones; pervasive computing; mHealth; data collection; survey error

Propõe-se um método de construção arquitetural de espaços virtuais, baseado na sobreposição de diversos modos de pensar o espaço e no uso de estruturas da mnemotécnica. Para essa tarefa, faz-se, inicialmente, uma análise crítica do estado da arte em dois campos disciplinares recorrentemente envolvidos na construção de tais ambientes: Interface Usuário-Computador e Realidade Virtual. Em seguida apresenta-se a maneira de se sobrepor diversos modos de pensar o espaço em Arquitetura, a qual constitui o terceiro campo disciplinar desse estudo, explicitado através da introdução e da análise de diferentes exemplos de concepções arquitetônicas pertencentes ao âmbito virtual. Definido como pertencente à mente, o espaço virtual é concebido através de métodos arquitetônicos, acrescidos do uso da Mnemônica, que é a arte e a técnica de se desenvolver e fortalecer a memória. O processo de memorização torna-se central no processo de construção do contexto virtual. Introduzido através de exemplos na história e de recentes aplicações artísticas em realidade virtual, a tese propõe a inclusão da mnemotécnica para a estruturação espacial arquitetônica no virtual / A method is proposed for the architectural construction of virtual spaces based on the overlaying of diverse ways of thinking about space and by using structures of mnemotechniques. In order to achieve this task, a critical review is first carried out of two disciplines which are regularly involved in the construction of this kind of spatiality: Human-Computer Interface, and Virtual Reality. Architecture, as a third and central discipline, presents its method of overlaying diverse ways of thinking space, made explicit through the introduction and analysis of different examples of architectural construction in the virtual realm. Defined as belonging to the mind, the virtual space is conceived through architectural methods by adding the use of Mnemonics, which is the art and technique of developing and making stronger the memory. The memorization process itself becomes central in the process of constructing the virtual context. Introducing examples in history and recent art applications in virtual reality, the thesis proposes the introduction of mnemotechniques for the architectural spatial structuring of the virtual

Auditory overviews have the potential to improve the quality of auditory interfaces. However, in order to apply overviews well, we must understand them. Specifically, what are they and what is their impact? This thesis presents six characteristics that overviews should have. They should be a structured representation of the detailed information, define the scope of the material, guide the user, show context and patterns in the data, encourage exploration of the detail and represent the current state of the data. These characteristics are guided by a systematic review of visual overview research, analysis of established visual overviews and evaluation of how these characteristics fit current auditory overviews. The second half of the thesis evaluates how the addition of an overview impacts user interaction. While the overviews do not improve performance, they do change the navigation patterns from one of data exploration and discovery to guided and directed information seeking. With these two contributions, we gain a better understanding of how overviews work in an auditory interface and how they might be exploited more effectively.

Online networks of individuals have been used to solve a number of problems in a scale that would not be possible if not within a connected, virtual and social environment such as the internet. However, the quality of solutions provided by individuals of an online network can vary significantly thus making work quality unreliable. This dissertation investigates factors that can influence the quality of the work output of individuals in online social networks. Specifically, we show that when solving tasks with small duration (under 5 minutes), also known as microtasks, individuals decision making will be strongly biased by costs of searching (and evaluating) options rather than financial or non-financial incentives. Indeed, we are able to show that we can influence individuals decisions, when solving problems, by rearranging elements visually to modify an the search sequence of an individual, be it by designing the virtual work environment or manipulating which options are first shown in non-controlled environments such as the Amazon Mechanical Turk labor market. We performed several experiments in online networks where individuals are invited to work on tasks with varying degrees of difficulty within three settings: mathematical games with objective truth (Sudoku and SAT instances), surveys with subjective evaluation (public policy polling) and labor markets (Amazon Mechanical Turk). We show that the time spent solving problems and the user interface are more relevant to the quality of work output than previous research have assumed and that individuals do not change this behavior while solving the sets of problems. Finally, to complement our study of online problem-solving, we present additional experiments in an online labor market (Amazon Mechanical Turk) that agrees with our networked experiments, shedding new light on how and why people solve problems.

書名中的[hu], 字形為: '點'在上, '尸'在下. / Shu ming zhong de [hu], zi xing wei: 'dian' zai shang, 'shi' zai xia. / Meng, Qiang. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 92-99). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Acknowledgement --- p.iv / Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- User Interaction in Medical Applications --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- UI Technologies and Challenges for Medical Systems --- p.2 / Chapter 1.3 --- Main Contributions of the Thesis --- p.5 / Chapter 1.4 --- Thesis Organization --- p.8 / Chapter 2 --- Interactive Vascular Designing and Modeling --- p.9 / Chapter 2.1 --- Introduction and Related Works --- p.10 / Chapter 2.2 --- Vascular Designing and Modeling System Overview --- p.12 / Chapter 2.3 --- Data Structure for Vascular Tree --- p.13 / Chapter 2.4 --- VesselEdit 一 A Freehand Vessel Skeleton Generator --- p.17 / Chapter 2.4.1 --- 2D scribble to create 3D vessel tree --- p.17 / Chapter 2.4.2 --- 3D Skeleton Editing --- p.18 / Chapter 2.5 --- Feature Point Selection and Spline Segment Construction --- p.18 / Chapter 2.5.1 --- Feature Point Update --- p.18 / Chapter 2.5.2 --- Feature Point Selection --- p.20 / Chapter 2.5.3 --- Spline Segment Construction --- p.20 / Chapter 2.6 --- Vascular Tree Visualization --- p.22 / Chapter 2.6.1 --- Curve Frame --- p.22 / Chapter 2.6.2 --- Bifurcation Frame --- p.24 / Chapter 2.6.3 --- Frame Junction and Blending --- p.25 / Chapter 2.6.4 --- Transparency Enhancement --- p.27 / Chapter 2.7 --- Modeling Case Study and Results --- p.28 / Chapter 2.7.1 --- Normal cases --- p.28 / Chapter 2.7.2 --- Pathological Cases for Vascular Interventional Simulation --- p.28 / Chapter 2.7.3 --- Timing Experiments --- p.30 / Chapter 3 --- Vascular Intervention Simulator System --- p.32 / Chapter 3.1 --- Introduction to Vascular Intervention Simulator --- p.33 / Chapter 3.2 --- Overview of the endovascSim System --- p.34 / Chapter 3.3 --- Guidewire Sensing Hardware Interface Design --- p.36 / Chapter 3.3.1 --- Catheter & Guidewire Motion Sensing Requirements --- p.36 / Chapter 3.3.2 --- Motion Sensing with Trackball Mouse --- p.38 / Chapter 3.3.3 --- Multi-Mouse Device for Catheter & Guidewire Motion Sens- ing --- p.39 / Chapter 4 --- User Interaction for Visible Human Slice Navigation --- p.42 / Chapter 4.1 --- Introduction and Related Works --- p.43 / Chapter 4.2 --- VH Slice Navigation System Overview --- p.44 / Chapter 4.3 --- VH Data Compression --- p.45 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- VH Data Down Sampling --- p.46 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Bounding Box Compression --- p.47 / Chapter 4.3.3 --- DXT Compression --- p.51 / Chapter 4.3.4 --- Compressed Visible Human Data Format --- p.53 / Chapter 4.4 --- Slice Pixels Calculation --- p.55 / Chapter 4.4.1 --- Pixels Color Computation --- p.55 / Chapter 4.4.2 --- CPU-GPU Cooperative Computation Framework --- p.58 / Chapter 4.4.3 --- CPU-GPU Computation Balancing Method --- p.60 / Chapter 4.5 --- User Interaction Design --- p.63 / Chapter 4.5.1 --- Slice navigation and haptic rendering --- p.64 / Chapter 4.5.2 --- Software UI layout and slice bookmarking --- p.66 / Chapter 4.6 --- System Implementation and Experimental Result --- p.68 / Chapter 5 --- Volume Data Exploration with Tangible Handheld Device --- p.71 / Chapter 5.1 --- Introduction and Related Works --- p.72 / Chapter 5.1.1 --- Introduction to Our Exploration System --- p.72 / Chapter 5.1.2 --- Ralated Works --- p.74 / Chapter 5.2 --- System Overview --- p.75 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Hardware --- p.76 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- Server Program --- p.77 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Client Program --- p.78 / Chapter 5.3 --- "Volumetric Data, Exploration and Annotation" --- p.78 / Chapter 5.3.1 --- Volume Data Manipulation --- p.79 / Chapter 5.3.2 --- "Volume Data, Slicing" --- p.80 / Chapter 5.3.3 --- "Volume Data, Visual Annotation" --- p.82 / Chapter 5.3.4 --- Volume Data Measurement --- p.84 / Chapter 6 --- Conclusion and Future Directions --- p.86 / Chapter 6.1 --- Conclusion --- p.86 / Chapter 6.2 --- Future Works --- p.88 / Publication List --- p.90 / Bibliography --- p.92

A difusão tecnológica e cultural do uso de dispositivos móveis está presente em todas as camadas da sociedade. Utilizados como mediadores em diferentes redes de comunicação, eles também carregam o significado de um espaço pessoal para o usuário. Sua utilização constante os transforma em potenciais sensores pessoais, gerando dados continuamente. Neste cenário, instituições e organizações governamentais utilizam-se de ferramentas digitais de georreferenciamento nos grandes centros urbanos do Brasil e do mundo para disponibilizar serviços ou coletar dados. Com o intuito de adaptar o modelo de navegação orientada utilizado na análise de portais governamentais para a análise de aplicativos móveis, foi realizada uma navegação orientada nos aplicativos selecionados, entre eles o 1746 RIO desenvolvido pelo Governo do Rio de Janeiro e o Colab desenvolvido por uma organização da sociedade civil. A navegação foi realizada com o auxilio de um roteiro de perguntas divididas em cinco principais categorias de análise: Acesso e Privacidade, Visualização e Edição de Informações, Feedback, Comunicação Social e Elementos de Gamificação. Para compreender o processo de experiência da cidadania foram realizadas entrevistas com uma ONG de São Paulo e observações em oficinas realizadas com cidadãos na cidade de Sorocaba. Pretende-se contribuir para o conhecimento na área de design e cidadania, apontando elementos e características para o desenvolvimento de aplicações móveis participativas voltadas para grandes cidades. / The technological and cultural dissemination of mobile devices usage is present in all segments of society. Used as an interface between different communication networks, mobile devices can also transform any space into one\'s own personal space. Its constant use convert them into potential personal sensors, generating data continuously. To adapt to this new paradigm governments are starting to implement georeference tools in order to provide services or collect data from major urban areas. Aiming to adapt the oriented navigation method to be performed in mobile devices, we designed a questionnaire roadmap acknowledging the main features of mobile devices. The analyzed applications include: Colab and 1746 Rio. The first is an initiative developed for citizens in a bottom-up approach intending to establish communication with city managers. The second was created by the City Hall of Rio de Janeiro and follows a topdown approach, being designed as a call center for the city residents. The questions were grouped in 5 main themes: Access rights and Privacy, View and Change Reports Data, Social Communication, Feedback, and Gamification Elements. In order to better understand how the citizenship is currently addressed, we conducted interviews with a São Paulo\'s NGO member. Also performed a non-participant observation over a workshop held at Sorocaba. This research aims to contribute to the discussion over the design and citizenship areas, suggesting elements and features for the development of participative mobile applications focused on data gathering in major cities.

Individuals who suffer from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) have a loss of motor control and possibly the loss of speech. A brain-computer interface (BCI) provides a means for communication through nonmuscular control. Visual BCIs have shown the highest potential when compared to other modalities; nonetheless, visual attention concepts are largely ignored during the development of BCI paradigms. Additionally, individual performance differences and personal preference are not considered in paradigm development. The traditional method to discover the best paradigm for the individual user is trial and error. Visual attention research and personal preference provide the building blocks and guidelines to develop a successful paradigm. This study is an examination of a BCI-based visual attention assessment in an ALS sample. This assessment takes into account the individual’s visual attention characteristics, performance, and personal preference to select a paradigm. The resulting paradigm is optimized to the individual and then tested online against the traditional row-column paradigm. The optimal paradigm had superior performance and preference scores over row-column. These results show that the BCI needs to be calibrated to individual differences in order to obtain the best paradigm for an end user.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and other neurodegenerative disorders can cause individuals to lose control of their muscles until they are unable to move or communicate. The development of brain-computer interface (BCI) technology has provided these individuals with an alternative method of communication that does not require muscle movement. Recent research has shown the impact psychological factors have on BCI performance and has highlighted the need for further research. Working memory is one psychological factor that could influence BCI performance. The purpose of the present study is to evaluate the relationship between working memory and brain-computer interface performance. The results indicate that both working memory and general intelligence are significant predictors of BCI performance. This suggests that working memory training could be used to improve performance on a BCI task.

The effects of neurodegenerative diseases such as amyotrophic-lateral sclerosis (ALS) eventually render those suffering from the illness unable to communicate, leaving their cognitive function relatively unharmed and causing them to be “locked-in” to their own body. With this primary function compromised there has been an increased need for assistive communication methods such as brain-computer interfaces (BCIs). Unlike several augmentative or alternative communication methods (AACs), BCIs do not require any muscular control, which makes this method ideal for people with ALS. The wealth of BCI research focuses mainly on increasing BCI performance through improving stimulus processing and manipulating paradigms. Recent research has suggested a need for studies focused on harnessing psychological qualities of BCI users, such as motivation, mood, emotion, and depression, in order to increase BCI performance through working with the user. The present studies address important issues related to P300-BCI performance: 1) the impact of mood, emotion, motivation, and depression on BCI performance were examined independently; and 2) pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral emotions were induced in order to determine the influence of emotion on BCI performance. By exploring psychological mechanisms that influence BCI performance, further insight can be gained on the best methods for improving BCI performance and increasing the number of potential BCI users. The results from Study 1 did not reveal a significant relationship between any of the four psychological factors and BCI performance. Since previous research has found a significant impact of motivation and mood on BCI performance, it may be the case that these factors only impact performance for some individuals. As this is the first study to directly investigate the impact of emotion and depression on BCI performance, future research should continue to explore these relationships. The results from Study 2 were inconclusive for the pleasant condition, since it appears the pleasant emotion manipulation was unsuccessful. The findings indicate that unpleasant emotions do not have a significant impact on BCI performance. This result is promising since it indicates that individuals should still be able to use the BCI system to communicate, even when they are experiencing unpleasant emotions. Future research should further explore the impact of pleasant emotions on BCI performance.

Although in the past 50 years significant advances based on research of brain-computer interface (BCI) technology have occurred, there is a scarcity of BCI assistive technology devices at the consumer level. This multiple case study explored user-centered clinical BCI device design strategies used by computer scientists designing BCI assistive technologies to meet patient-centered outcomes. The population for the study encompassed computer scientists experienced with clinical BCI assistive technology design located in the midwestern, northeastern, and southern regions of the United States, as well as western Europe. The multi-motive information systems continuance model was the conceptual framework for the study. Interview data were collected from 7 computer scientists and 28 archival documents. Guided by the concepts of user-centered design and patient-centered outcomes, thematic analysis was used to identify codes and themes related to computer science and the design of BCI assistive technology devices. Notable themes included customization of clinical BCI devices, consideration of patient/caregiver interaction, collective data management, and evolving technology. Implications for social change based on the findings from this research include focus on meeting individualized patient-centered outcomes; enhancing collaboration between researchers, caregivers, and patients in BCI device development; and reducing the possibility of abandonment or disuse of clinical BCI assistive technology devices.