Communicative Presence in Videocommunications

Author(s):  
Martin Böcker ◽  
Lothar Mühlbach

This paper deals with factors affecting Communicative Presence in videocommunications. Communicative Presence is defined as the capacity of a system to transfer mutual communicative signals of interlocutors. The experiment the paper reports on examined the effects of various features of videoconferencing systems in terms of several aspects, such as the conferees' feeling of being individually addressed by non-verbal signals (e.g. eye-contact), the flow of conversation, user satisfaction, and the willingness to use videoconferencing systems. One system feature that was systematically varied was the degree of vertical and horizontal eye-contact angles. In order to reduce the horizontal eye-contact angles for the two test subjects acting as conferees at one site of the experimental set-up, two different images (one per conferee) which were in accordance with the perspectives the conferees would have in a similar face-to-face meeting were displayed (“view-per-person” principle). Another feature that was examined was the spatial resolution of the displayed images. The results showed that large eye-contact angles as well as a low resolution decrease the feeling of Communicative Presence. Within the framework of the experiment, the hypothesis concerning the benefits of a view-per-person representation could not be verified.

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-133
Author(s):  
Sara Maria Franchin ◽  
Federico Giordani ◽  
Michele Tonellato ◽  
Michael Benazzato ◽  
Giuseppe Marcolin ◽  
...  

Wheelchair rugby is a sport ideated for individuals with cervical spinal cord injury (CSCI) which is extremely important for maintaining their neuromuscular abilities and improving their social and psychological wellbeing. However, due to the frequent changes in direction and speed it considerably stresses the players’ upper limbs. 13 athletes have undergone two sports-related tests on an inertial drum bench and several kinematic parameters have been registered. Most athletes use a semi-circular pattern which is considered protective for the upper limb. With increasing speed, range of motion (ROM) increases. Release angles increment and contact angles reduce, displacing the push angle forward to increase speed. Instead, the more anterior late push angle used to increase velocity is a factor which further loads the shoulder joint. However, other factors affecting propulsion technique, such as posture and wheelchair set up should be studied to further reduce loading on the upper limb.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 38-50
Author(s):  
Shahidul Islam Bhuiya ◽  
Mohammad Bodrul Munir ◽  
AKM Nowsad Alam ◽  
Fozlul Kabeer ◽  
Md. Jamal Hossain ◽  
...  

Inland capture fisheries are providing cost of livings of about 1.2 million BDT in Bangladesh. However, overexploitation causes the declination of the abundance of native fish species which adversely affects the livelihoods of haor dwellers. The present study was conducted in two haor villages (Sutarpara and Changnoagaon) of Kishoreganj, Bangladesh to explore the factors (economic and non-economic) affecting fishers’ attitude and willingness about cage aquaculture considered as livelihood alternative for reducing fishing pressure. The methodologies applied to do this study were semi-structured face-to-face interview, key informants and questionnaire survey using Likert scale (LS), focus group discussions (FGD). The result revealed that willingness to switch from traditional way of fishing to cage aquaculture activities was significantly (p<0.05) higher in those fishers’ groups that had more inclination in fishing activities. Simultaneously, non-economic factors like powerful traders and fishers, traditional belief, taking risk, launching period of cage aquaculture venture and investment duration played vital role in decisions on whether to fish or not. The economic factors were fewer in number than non-economic factors. This comparative research is significantly important for future social aquaculture researchers as well as the country policy makers for giving emphasis to gather data based on the prevailing economic and non-economic factors to innovate alternative livelihood activity concurrently.


Author(s):  
Angela Prussog ◽  
Lothar Mühlbach ◽  
Martin Böcker

The paper discusses factors that affect the impression of telepresence in video-communications. Telepresence is experienced by interlocutors to the extent to which natural visual cues from the remote site are adequately transferred by the medium. The paper reports on two experimental Human Factors studies investigating the effects of various features of videoconferencing systems in terms of, inter alia, the conferees' impression of telepresence as well as user satisfaction and the willingness to use those systems. Within the framework of Experiment 1 the system features that were varied were the scale of representing the conferees (natural vs. reduced size) and the representation of the conferees' surroundings (small vs. large sector of the remote room). In Experiment 2 the system feature being tested was the stereoscopic representation of the conferees. Results showed that both the natural-size representation of conferees as well as the stereoscopic representation increase the impression of telepresence. The expected benefits of a representation of the conferees' surroundings could not be verified. Given a fixed size of the screen, the trade-off between the conferees' size and the representation of surroundings is in favor of the natural size representation.


2003 ◽  
Vol 9 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 52-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clare Guilfoyle ◽  
Richard Wootton ◽  
Stacey Hassall ◽  
Jann Offer ◽  
Margo Warren ◽  
...  

summary We have investigated the role of videoconferencing in allied health service provision to high-care clients in rural residential facilities. Videoconferencing equipment was set up at a rural aged-care facility and a metropolitan allied health centre; ISDN transmission at 384 kbit/s was used to link the equipment. Twelve residents were assessed by both videoconference and face to face across five allied health disciplines (a total of 120 assessments). User satisfaction was measured using questionnaires and focus groups. Face-to-face assessment took significantly longer than videoconferencing assessment. However, the mean satisfaction ratings for face-to-face assessments were higher than for videoconferencing and the majority of the staff preferred the face-to-face format. Videoconferencing was particularly useful for consultations and the initial stages of the assessment process. A number of issues relating to the videoconferencing equipment, to the environment in which assessments were performed and to the clients themselves need to be addressed in order for this form of service delivery to be effective.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lim Jit Fan Christina ◽  
Goh Boon Kwang ◽  
Chee Wing Ling Vivian ◽  
Tang Woh Peng ◽  
Goh Qiuling Bandy

BACKGROUND Traditionally, patients wishing to obtain their prescription medications have had to present themselves physically at pharmacy counters and collect their medications via face-to-face interactions with pharmacy staff. Prescription in Locker Box (PILBOX) is a new innovation which allows patients and their caregivers to collect their medication asynchronously, 24/7 at their convenience, from medication lockers instead of from pharmacy staff and at any time convenient to them instead of being restricted to pharmacy operating hours. OBJECTIVE This study aimed to determine the willingness by patients/caregivers to use this new innovation and factors that affect their willingness. METHODS This prospective cross-sectional study was conducted over 2 months at 2 public primary healthcare centres in Singapore. Patients or caregivers who were at least 21 yo and turned up at the pharmacies to collect medications were administered a self-developed 3-part questionnaire face-to-face by trained study team members, if they gave their consent to participate in the study. RESULTS A total of 222 participants completed the study. About 40% of them participants were willing to use the PILBOX to collect their medications. Amongst the participants who were keen to use the PILBOX service, slightly more than half (i.e. 52.8%) of them were willing to pay for the PILBOX service. The participants felt that the ease of use (3.46±1.21 i.e. mean of ranking score ± standard deviation) of the PILBOX was the most important factor that would affect their willingness to use the medication pick up service. This was followed by “waiting time” (3.37±1.33), cost of using the medication pick up service (2.96±1.44) and 24/7 accessibility (2.62±1.35). This study also found that age (p=0.006), language literacy (p=0.000), education level (p=0.000), working status (p=0.011) and personal monthly income (p=0.009) were factors that affected the willingness of the patients or caregivers to use the PILBOX. CONCLUSIONS Patients and caregivers are keen to use PILBOX to collect their medications for its convenience and the opportunity to save time, if it is easy to use and not costly.


2021 ◽  
Vol 108 (Supplement_2) ◽  
Author(s):  
S Westley ◽  
H Creasy ◽  
R Mistry

Abstract Introduction The Queen Victoria Hospital (QVH) was designated a cancer and trauma hub during the COVID-19 pandemic. With this, a new virtual hand trauma clinic was set up. We assess accuracy of assessment within this virtual set-up with comparison to pre COVID-19 face-to-face assessment. Method Two weeks of clinic sessions during and pre lockdown were analysed. Initial assessment was compared with the patient's operation note. Results In the pre COVID-19 two-week period 129 face-to-face appointments were analysed. Of 99 patients that required surgery 77 (78%) had an accurate assessment. 6 were overestimated, 12 were underestimated. 189 patients were seen over two weeks during lockdown via telephone or video call. Accuracy of assessment increased with seniority of the clinician. Of 126 patients that required an operation 109 (87%) had an accurate assessment; all structures injured were correctly predicted. 12 were overestimated, 5 had their injury underestimated. Conclusions The new virtual clinic allowed patients to be remotely assessed during lockdown, reducing footfall and unnecessary journeys. We found that virtual clinic assessments are accurate, and no patient underwent an unnecessary procedure. Using a telephone call plus photo gave similar accuracy as a video call. Virtual assessment was more accurate than face-to-face assessment.


2021 ◽  
Vol 108 (Supplement_2) ◽  
Author(s):  
B Holmes ◽  
U Mirza ◽  
C Manning ◽  
R Cooke ◽  
R Jugdey

Abstract Introduction COVID-19 has placed unprecedented demand on services at ELHT and it has become necessary to have telephone clinics to reduce the number of face-to-face clinics. A ‘telephone triage clinic’ was set up for referrals from A&E. Our project evaluated patient and clinician satisfaction on this. Method We carried out a retrospective telephone questionnaire with patients over a one-week period during the pandemic. We focussed on overall satisfaction of the consultation and quality of communication. Consultants were also surveyed for their opinion on the clinics. Results From 30 patients, 77% said they were ‘very satisfied’ with the overall experience. 80% of patients were ‘very satisfied’ with the overall length of the telephone consultation. 50% of patients felt the clinician was only ‘adequately’ able to assess them over the telephone. The consultants were less satisfied with the overall experience of telephone consultation. A common theme was that they felt ED documentation could be improved to help inform ongoing management. Conclusions Overall, patients were satisfied with the consultations. It has been successful in minimising face to face consultations however some presentations necessitate further evaluation. We need to identify those injuries appropriate for virtual follow up and design a local protocol for these.


Author(s):  
Alicja Niedźwiecka

AbstractEye contact is a crucial aspect of social interactions that may enhance an individual’s cognitive performance (i.e. the eye contact effect) or hinder it (i.e. face-to-face interference effect). In this paper, I focus on the influence of eye contact on cognitive performance in tasks engaging executive functions. I present a hypothesis as to why some individuals benefit from eye contact while others do not. I propose that the relations between eye contact and executive functioning are modulated by an individual’s autonomic regulation and reactivity and self-regulation of attention. In particular, I propose that individuals with more optimal autonomic regulation and reactivity, and more effective self-regulation of attention benefit from eye contact. Individuals who are less well regulated and over- or under-reactive and who do not employ effective strategies of self-regulation of attention may not benefit from eye contact and may perform better when eye contact is absent. I present some studies that justify the proposed hypothesis and point to a method that could be employed to test them. This approach could help to better understand the complex mechanisms underlying the individual differences in participant’s cognitive performance during tasks engaging executive functions.


2019 ◽  
Vol 67 (7) ◽  
pp. 338-349
Author(s):  
Maryam Afshari ◽  
Jalal Poorolajal ◽  
Forouzan Rezapur-Shahkolai ◽  
Mohammad Javad Assari ◽  
Akram Karimi-Shahanjarini

Farmers in developing countries use harmful pesticides while taking few or no protective measures. There is limited evidence on factors affecting their safety measures. The objective of this study was to identify the underlying factors influencing farmers’ protective behaviors (PBs) and use of personal protective equipment (PPE) during the exposure to pesticides. From April to August 2017, a descriptive study was conducted in Twiserkan County in western Iran among 474 farmers from 104 villages. A questionnaire was developed to measure demographic characteristics and factors suggested in integrated agent-centered (IAC) framework. The questionnaire was validated in terms of content validity through expert reviews and tested for reliability in a group of farmers. Data were collected by face-to-face interviews with farmers. Physiological arousal (β = .154, p < .05), intention (β = .345, p < .05), habit (β = .188, p < .05), and contextual factors (β = .101, p < .05) had a significant and positive impact on farmers engaging in pesticide PBs. Among the assessed factors, only physiological arousal (β = .122, p < .05) and habit (β = .646, p < .05) were found to have a significant and positive effect on the use of PPE, but the intention (β = –.039, p > .05) and contextual factors (β = –.009, p > .05) had no significant relation with the use of PPE. The results of this study identified determinants of farmers’ safety measures. Our results suggest that the IAC framework could serve as a guide to developing a more effective intervention for safety measures of Iranian farmers.


2003 ◽  
Vol 208 ◽  
pp. 427-428
Author(s):  
D. Molteni ◽  
F. Fauci ◽  
G. Gerardi ◽  
M. A. Valenza

Results of 3D numerical simulations of the gas transfer in close binary systems show that it is possible the production of accretion streams having low specific angular momentum in a region close to the accreting star. These streams are mainly placed above the orbital disc. The eventual formation of such bulges and shock heated flows is interesting in the context of advection dominated solutions and for the explanation of spectral properties of the Black Hole candidates in binary systems. We set up a parallelized version of 3D S.P.H. code, using domain decomposion. with increasing spatial resolution around the compact star.


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