Skip to main content

Research Areas

The HealthyPhases Project is structured around three primary Research Areas that guide our scientific approach and methodology:

Aim 1: Ontology Development​

Our first aim focuses on developing robust ontological frameworks to standardize terminology and relationships in solitude and gerotranscendence research.

Objectives​

  • Consensus Building: Work with domain experts to establish agreed-upon definitions of key terms
  • Formal Representation: Create machine-readable representations of terms and their relationships
  • Competency Questions: Develop and test questions that guide ontology design and validate its sufficiency
  • Term Definition: Precisely define terms like "solitude," "loneliness," "isolation," and "gerotranscendence"
  • Relationship Modeling: Map the complex relationships between different aspects of being alone and well-being

Methods​

  • Expert workshops and consensus-building exercises
  • Formal ontology development using standard languages (OWL)
  • Integration with existing upper-level ontologies
  • Validation through competency questions and use cases

Aim 2: Ontology-Based Web Resources​

Our second aim is to create practical web-based resources that implement the ontological framework and support research and practice.

Common Data Model​

  • Standardize data elements for collecting solitude and gerotranscendence data
  • Provide a simplified data model that researchers can easily adopt
  • Promote data sharing and interoperability across studies

Semantic Enrichment​

  • Use ontology to build knowledge graphs for inference and data harmonization
  • Add metadata (e.g., synonyms, related terms) to enhance retrieval and analysis
  • Support data quality through SHACL (Shapes Constraint Language) validation

Technical Implementation​

  • Develop web interfaces for data annotation and exploration
  • Create SPARQL endpoints for querying semantically enriched data
  • Implement Large Language Models for Q/A and recommendations based on the ontology

Aim 3: Promotion and Dissemination​

Our third aim focuses on promoting the adoption of our ontological framework and resources across the research community.

Research Community Engagement​

  • Present at gerontology conferences:

    • Gerontological Society of America (GSA) Annual Scientific Meeting
    • International Society for the Study of Behavioral Development (ISSBD) biennial meeting

  • Present at ontology/semantic technology conferences:

    • International Conference on Biomedical Ontology (ICBO)
    • Formal Ontology in Information Systems (FOIS)
    • Annual Knowledge Graph Conference (KGC)
    • U.S. Semantic Technologies Symposium Series (US2TS)

Educational Resources​

  • Develop training materials and documentation
  • Host workshops for researchers in gerontology and aging studies
  • Create guides for implementing the common data model

Sustainability Planning​

  • Establish long-term maintenance procedures
  • Develop community governance models
  • Create pipelines for ongoing ontology evolution and refinement

Through these three interconnected aims, the HealthyPhases Project will create a semantic foundation that bridges isolated research areas and advances our understanding of the complex relationship between solitude experiences and healthy aging.