BIOE 500 Fall 2025 - Dr. Wendy Rogers

Harnessing Technology to Support Health for an Aging Society

Abstract: Older adults are living longer, including people who have long-term disabilities such as hearing, vision, mobility, and cognitive impairments.  Technology advances have the potential to support their successful aging but are not always designed with consideration for their interests, capabilities, limitations, needs, and preferences.  My research program is specifically oriented toward developing a fundamental understanding of aging to support technology design for health and wellness of older adults.  I will provide examples of our research on understanding user needs for everyday activities that include ADLs ( Activities of Daily Living such as bathing, mobility, eating); IADLs (Instrumental Activities of Daily Living such as medication management, financial planning, health monitoring), EADLs (Enhanced Activities of Daily Living which include new learning, volunteering, leisure activities), and DADLs (Digital Activities of Daily Living, such as configuring devices, setting up user accounts, and navigating digital interfaces).  I will share our methodologies for obtaining user needs through exploring lived experiences and interactive engagements with technology.  In addition, I will highlight our research on human-robot interaction innovations for older adults with cognitive and mobility impairments.  The overall goal of the presentation will be to provide an overview of the user needs of older adults with perceptual, mobility, and cognitive impairments to inspire design innovations that improve quality of life.

Biography: Wendy A. Rogers, Ph.D., is Khan Professor of Applied Health Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.  Her primary appointment is in the Department of Health & Kinesiology.  She has an appointment in Educational Psychology and is affiliate of the Beckman Institute, Illinois Informatics Institute; Center for Social and Behavioral Science; the Discovery Partners Institute; the Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program; and the Coordinated Science Lab Robotics Group.  She received her B.A. from the University of Massachusetts - Dartmouth, and her M.S. and Ph.D. from the Georgia Institute of Technology.  She is a Certified Human Factors Professional (BCPE Certificate #1539).  Her research interests include design for aging; technology acceptance; human-automation interaction; aging-in-place; human-robot interaction; aging with disabilities; cognitive aging; and training.  She is the Director of the McKechnie Family LIFE Home; Program Director of CHART (Collaborations in Health, Aging, Research, and Technology); and Director of the Human Factors and Aging Laboratory.