0000000000736016

AUTHOR

Alicia Carrion-plaza

HabitApp: New Play Technologies in Pediatric Cancer to Improve the Psychosocial State of Patients and Caregivers

[EN] Childhood cancer involves long periods of hospitalization that trigger emotions such as fear or sadness. Previous research has studied the positive effects of technology games on improving the hospitalization experience, but most do not focus on caregivers and none allow interaction with the real time observation of a zoo. The present study evaluates the impact of HabitApp and assesses the short-term impact on the psychosocial state of patients and caregivers in order to improve the hospitalization experience. The participants in this study were 39 patients plus 39 caregivers. A quantitative analysis revealed a significant improvement in patient's and caregiver's psychosocial factors f…

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Remote interspecies interactions: Improving humans and animals wellbeing through mobile playful spaces

[EN] Play is an essential activity for both humans and animals as it provides stimulation and favors cognitive, physical and social development. This paper proposes a novel pervasive playful environment that allows hospitalized children to participate in remote interspecies play with dogs in a dog daycare facility, while it also allows the dogs to play by themselves with the pervasive system. The aim of this playful interactive space is to help improving both children¿s and animal¿s wellbeing and their relationships by means of technologically mediated play, while creating a solid knowledge base to define the future of pervasive interactive environments for animals.

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