An Evaluation of a Telepresence Robot: User Testing among Older Adults with Mobility Impairment

For older adults with mobility impairment, maintaining health and wellness while aging-in-place independently is crucial. Telepresence technology, such as Kubi, can be potentially beneficial for this target population to stay socially connected [1]. However, the Kubi robot is not specifically designed for older adults with mobility impairment. For this target population to adopt the technology successfully, it is important to ensure that they would not experience usability barriers. Thus, we conducted usability testing of Kubi with five older adults with self-reported mobility impairment. The findings indicated both hardware and GUI problematic issues for this population. Hardware problems were primarily related to the base. GUI usability issues were caused by system visibility and control of the robot. These findings provide direction for improving the usability of telepresence robots, particularly for adults aging with mobility impairment.