Monitoring daily activities and behaviors at home by using brief sensors

Abstract

In maintaining the health of not only elderly people but also younger, it can be useful to monitor their health status through their daily routines. This paper reports on monitoring daily routine behavior in ordinary houses. The authors attempted to monitor daily behavior of subjects mainly in the kitchen and dining room. Many brief sensors were installed such as infrared sensors to detect human movement, magnetic switches to detect opening and closing doors, a carbon dioxide sensor to detect presence of the subject, temperature sensors at the kitchen sink to detect cooking. Three subjects (22 years female, 30 years male, and 76 years female) who live alone were selected and monitored for a month each. Output of sensors were recorded in a personal computer. Monitoring was performed fully automatically. As a result, habits of daily activities could be dearly identified. It was demonstrated that daily behaviors could be monitored with sensor outputs. Such monitoring can contribute to the maintenance of health.