Online fraud is a critical global threat that disproportionately targets older adults. Prior anti-fraud education for older adults has largely relied on static, traditional instruction that limits engagement and real-world transfer, whereas role-based simulation offers realistic yet low-risk opportunities for practice. Moreover, most interventions situate learners as victims, overlooking that fraud encounters often involve multiple roles, such as bystanders who witness scams and helpers who support victims. To address this gap, we developed ROLESafe, an anti-fraud educational intervention in which older adults learn through different learning roles, including Experiencer (experiencing fraud), Helper (assisting a victim), and Observer (witnessing fraud). In a between-subjects study with 144 older adults in China, we found that the Experiencer and Helper roles significantly improved participants' ability to identify online fraud. These findings highlight the promise of role-based, multi-perspective simulations for enhancing fraud awareness among older adults and provide design implications for future anti-fraud education.

翻译：网络诈骗是一项严重的全球性威胁，其受害者中老年人比例尤为突出。以往针对老年人的反诈骗教育主要依赖静态的传统讲授，这限制了学习者的参与度和知识向现实场景的迁移，而基于角色的模拟则提供了真实且低风险的实践机会。此外，大多数干预措施仅将学习者置于受害者角色，忽视了诈骗遭遇通常涉及多种角色，例如目睹骗局的旁观者以及为受害者提供帮助的协助者。为弥补这一不足，我们开发了ROLESafe——一种反诈骗教育干预方案，让老年人通过不同的学习角色进行学习，包括体验者（亲身经历诈骗）、协助者（帮助受害者）和旁观者（目睹诈骗）。在中国144名老年人参与的组间研究中，我们发现体验者与协助者角色显著提升了参与者识别网络诈骗的能力。这些发现凸显了基于角色、多视角模拟在提升老年人诈骗防范意识方面的潜力，并为未来的反诈骗教育提供了设计启示。