Computing and Information Systems - Research Publications
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ItemEditorial: Designing Technology for Emotions to Improve Mental Health and Wellbeing(Frontiers Media SA, 2022-05-16)
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ItemTransitioning from motivational goal models to user stories within user-centred software design(First International Interdisciplinary Workshop on Requirements Engineering for Sociotechnical Systems, 2021)Motivational goal modelling has evolved from agent-oriented models to allow a shared understanding of a project by diverse stakeholders. Building a motivational model is in the spirit of user-centred design. Requirements artefacts such as user stories and personas should be developed consistently with the model. This paper describes a method to generate user stories from motivational models. The generated stories are checked by users and developers to ensure readabilty and clarity. The method has been partially automated within an extension to an editing tool.
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ItemPromoting Personal Recovery in People with Persisting Psychotic Disorders: Development and Pilot Study of a Novel Digital Intervention(FRONTIERS MEDIA SA, 2016-12-23)BACKGROUND: For people with persisting psychotic disorders, personal recovery has become an important target of mental health services worldwide. Strongly influenced by mental health service consumer perspectives, personal recovery refers to being able to live a satisfying and contributing life irrespective of ongoing symptoms and disability. Contact with peers with shared lived experience is often cited as facilitative of recovery. We aimed to develop and pilot a novel recovery-based digitally supported intervention for people with a psychotic illness. METHODS: We developed a website to be used on a tablet computer by mental health workers to structure therapeutic discussions about personal recovery. Central to the site was a series of video interviews of people with lived experience of psychosis discussing how they had navigated issues within their own recovery based on the Connectedness-Hope-Identity-Meaning-Empowerment model of recovery. We examined the feasibility and acceptability of an 8-session low intensity intervention using this site in 10 participants with persisting psychotic disorders and conducted a proof-of-concept analysis of outcomes. RESULTS: All 10 participants completed the full course of sessions, and it was possible to integrate use of the website into nearly all sessions. Participant feedback confirmed that use of the website was a feasible and acceptable way of working. All participants stated that they would recommend the intervention to others. Post-intervention, personal recovery measured by the Questionnaire for the Process of Recovery had improved by an average standardized effect of d = 0.46, 95% CI [0.07, 0.84], and 8 of the 10 participants reported that their mental health had improved since taking part in the intervention. CONCLUSION: In-session use of digital resources featuring peer accounts of recovery is feasible and acceptable and shows promising outcomes. A randomized controlled trial is the next step in evaluating the efficacy of this low intensity intervention when delivered in conjunction with routine mental health care.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableDevelopment of a Mobile Clinical Prediction Tool to Estimate Future Depression Severity and Guide Treatment in Primary Care: User-Centered Design(JMIR PUBLICATIONS, INC, 2018-04)BACKGROUND: Around the world, depression is both under- and overtreated. The diamond clinical prediction tool was developed to assist with appropriate treatment allocation by estimating the 3-month prognosis among people with current depressive symptoms. Delivering clinical prediction tools in a way that will enhance their uptake in routine clinical practice remains challenging; however, mobile apps show promise in this respect. To increase the likelihood that an app-delivered clinical prediction tool can be successfully incorporated into clinical practice, it is important to involve end users in the app design process. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to maximize patient engagement in an app designed to improve treatment allocation for depression. METHODS: An iterative, user-centered design process was employed. Qualitative data were collected via 2 focus groups with a community sample (n=17) and 7 semistructured interviews with people with depressive symptoms. The results of the focus groups and interviews were used by the computer engineering team to modify subsequent protoypes of the app. RESULTS: Iterative development resulted in 3 prototypes and a final app. The areas requiring the most substantial changes following end-user input were related to the iconography used and the way that feedback was provided. In particular, communicating risk of future depressive symptoms proved difficult; these messages were consistently misinterpreted and negatively viewed and were ultimately removed. All participants felt positively about seeing their results summarized after completion of the clinical prediction tool, but there was a need for a personalized treatment recommendation made in conjunction with a consultation with a health professional. CONCLUSIONS: User-centered design led to valuable improvements in the content and design of an app designed to improve allocation of and engagement in depression treatment. Iterative design allowed us to develop a tool that allows users to feel hope, engage in self-reflection, and motivate them to treatment. The tool is currently being evaluated in a randomized controlled trial.
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ItemTeaching Motivational Models in Agile Requirements Engineering(Presentation in Workshop, 2018)Software engineering courses continually strive to maintain an excellent teaching curriculum that provides students with the agile skills as per industry needs. A particular challenge of teaching requirements engineering is capturing and communicating software requirements without killing team agility with excessive documentation. In many projects, requirements can be ambiguous and inconsistent. It is important to find a middle ground between completely by-passing requirements documentation and writing a complete Software Requirements Specification. In this paper, we report our experiences, presenting a guideline for students and educators who wish to adopt motivational modelling, a lightweight approach to requirements elicitation and modelling, for agile requirements engineering. Motivational modelling is an efficient technique that also represents a good boundary object to support discussions between developers and non-technical clients. Finally, we outline discussion points regarding where motivational models could fit into other agile practices.
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ItemMaking a Year-Long Software Engineering Project Agile(Session only in workshop, 2018)We describe the transformation of a year-long software engineering project subject from being primarily document-driven to being run with agile processes. The revised subject is currently being offered in a masters course at an Australian research university. The subject gives students great industry experience while meeting course and accreditation requirements. We claim that the agile approach better fits the needs of a modern software engineering capstone project.
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ItemMethods for Supporting Older Users in Communicating Their Emotions at Different Phases of a Living Lab Project(Carleton University, 2017)
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ItemRandomised controlled trial of a digitally assisted low intensity intervention to promote personal recovery in persisting psychosis: SMART-Therapy study protocol(BMC, 2016-09-07)BACKGROUND: Psychosocial interventions have an important role in promoting recovery in people with persisting psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia. Readily available, digital technology provides a means of developing therapeutic resources for use together by practitioners and mental health service users. As part of the Self-Management and Recovery Technology (SMART) research program, we have developed an online resource providing materials on illness self-management and personal recovery based on the Connectedness-Hope-Identity-Meaning-Empowerment (CHIME) framework. Content is communicated using videos featuring persons with lived experience of psychosis discussing how they have navigated issues in their own recovery. This was developed to be suitable for use on a tablet computer during sessions with a mental health worker to promote discussion about recovery. METHODS/DESIGN: This is a rater-blinded randomised controlled trial comparing a low intensity recovery intervention of eight one-to-one face-to-face sessions with a mental health worker using the SMART website alongside routine care, versus an eight-session comparison condition, befriending. The recruitment target is 148 participants with a schizophrenia-related disorder or mood disorder with a history of psychosis, recruited from mental health services in Victoria, Australia. Following baseline assessment, participants are randomised to intervention, and complete follow up assessments at 3, 6 and 9 months post-baseline. The primary outcome is personal recovery measured using the Process of Recovery Questionnaire (QPR). Secondary outcomes include positive and negative symptoms assessed with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale, subjective experiences of psychosis, emotional symptoms, quality of life and resource use. Mechanisms of change via effects on self-stigma and self-efficacy will be examined. DISCUSSION: This protocol describes a novel intervention which tests new therapeutic methods including in-session tablet computer use and video-based peer modelling. It also informs a possible low intensity intervention model potentially viable for delivery across the mental health workforce. TRIAL REGISTRATION: NCT02474524 , 24 May 2015, retrospectively registered during the recruitment phase.
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ItemEmotion-led modelling for people-oriented requirements engineering: The case study of emergency systems(Elsevier, 2015-07-01)In the field of design, it is accepted that users’ perceptions of systems are influenced by emotion as much as cognition, and functionally-complete products will not be adopted if they do not appeal to emotions. While software engineering methodologies have matured to handle non-functional requirements such as usability, what has not been investigated fully is the emotional needs of people. That is, what do users want to feel, and how do they feel about a system? In this paper, we argue that these emotional desires should be treated as first-class citizens in software engineering methodology, and present preliminary work on including emotions in requirements models using emotional goals. We evaluate these models both with a controlled user study, and on a case study of emergency systems for older people. The results of the controlled user study indicate that people are comfortable interpreting and modifying our models, and view the inclusion of emotions as first-class entities as a positive step in software engineering. The results of our case study indicate that current emergency systems fail to address the emotional needs their users, leading to low adoption and low usage. We conceptualised, designed, and prototyped an improved emergency system, and placed it into the homes of nine older people over a period of approximately two weeks each, showing improved user satisfaction over existing systems.
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ItemReconciling ontological differences by assistant agents(ACM, 2006-12-01)