BACKGROUND
Loneliness and social isolation are major public health concerns for older adults, with severe mental and physical health consequences. New technologies may have a great impact in providing support to the daily life of older adults and responding to the many challenges they face. In this scenario, technologies based on vocal assistants (VAs) are of great interest and potential benefit in reducing loneliness and social isolation of this population, because they could overcome existing barriers with other digital technologies through easier and more natural human-computer interaction.
OBJECTIVE
This paper aimed to investigate the use of VAs to reduce loneliness and social isolation of older adults by performing a systematic literature review and a bibliometric cluster mapping analysis.
METHODS
We searched PubMed, Embase and Scopus databases for articles, published in the last 6 years, related to the following main topics: voice interface, voice assistant, older adults, isolation and loneliness. A total of 40 articles were found, of which 16 were included in this review. Then, included articles were assessed through a qualitative scoring method and summarized. Finally, a bibliometric analysis, using VOSviewer, was conducted.
RESULTS
Among the sixteen articles included in the review, only two were considered of poor methodological quality, while nine articles were of medium and five of high quality. Finally, through bibliometric analysis, 329 keywords were extracted, of which 55 were selected. Most important keywords, by number of occurrences and by total link strength, results of the analysis with the Association Strength normalisation method and default values were then presented. The final bibliometric network consisted in 5 clusters with 49 selected keywords.
CONCLUSIONS
Most articles on the use of VAs with older adults to reduce social isolation and loneliness focus on usability, acceptability or user experience. Nevertheless, studies directly addressing the impact that using a voice assistant has on the social isolation and loneliness of older adults find positive and promising results and provide important information for future research, interventions and policy development in the field of geriatric care and technology.