Do you have Amazon Echo Show?

Over the next few posts, I will be focusing on some technology that might help us as we age, the ideas come from the work done at Tech life. 

Some of my tech friends think that Alexa or Amazon Echo might help combat isolation and loneliness. This is an interesting idea and one that was explored by Tech Life a while back. I thought I would share some of their thoughts.  

When we look at the idea of using these tools to combat isolation and loneliness there are two separate ideas about how it could be done.

First, there is the idea, getting a fair bit of media attention, that interaction between an older adult and an AI (Alexa) might help reduce isolation.

Second is the idea that Alexa (an AI) can facilitate deeper human to human interactions (with friends and family for example) as well.

It's this second idea that Tech life found intriguing and based on their recent explorations of Alexa and the Amazon Echo Show, they think this tool has real potential to combat isolation and loneliness.

Alexa is an artificial intelligence (AI) developed by Amazon and made available in a family of hardware products with names like the Amazon Echo, the Amazon Echo Dot and recently the Amazon Echo Show.

To understand how older adults would interact Tech Life had older adults interact with the tools. Most of these adults said that having artificial intelligence to interact with was certainly cool, and found it very useful. The question that Tech life wanted to explore was if Alexa could also improve the depth and quantity of our interactions with our fellow humans to reduce isolation and loneliness.

Social Isolation and Loneliness are complex conditions, with a variety of contributing causes which vary greatly from person to person.

But there are several ways in which you can imagine Alexa can make a difference.

·       Interactions directly with an AI (Alexa herself);

·       Interactions with other humans — made easier or better or more frequent by Alexa.

And as far as interacting with humans is concerned, there are two subcategories that Tech Life explored:

·       Deeper interactions with friends and family who live far away; and

·       Making new friends; or finding acquaintances with the right interests or personalities.