Helen Knight writing for New Scientist, Magazine issue 2862, reports about a new navigation device for blind people in the article "Robot Sensing and Smartphones to Help Blind Navigate". It was presented in the talk "Intelligent Glasses? Visuo-tactile Assistance for Visually Impaired Interaction" at the MIT: "Edwige Pissaloux and colleagues at Pierre and Marie Curie
University's Institute of Intelligent Systems and Robotics (ISIR) have
developed technology that could eventually let blind users navigate
their surroundings without assistance. The system features glasses
outfitted with cameras and sensors like those employed in robot
exploration, and it generates a three-dimensional map of the user's
environment and their position in it, which is continuously updated and
displayed on a handheld electronic Braille device. The system produces
nearly 10 maps each second, which are transmitted to the Braille device
and displayed as a dynamic tactile map. Pissaloux says the Braille
map's update speed is sufficient for a visually impaired wearer to
navigate an area at walking speed." read more
As much as I welcome the development of new technology in the mobility area for visually disabled I really wonder how low-tech these gadgets seem to be in terms of cognitive consideration put into the development. This particular work is developed in the robotics domain and uses advances computer vision techniques to determine what to display on a small Braille pad - so one might understand that it is technology focussed. From that aspect this project is interesting as it employs shape memory alloy
to bring the tactual entities into being (I could not varify if the
result is a continous surface or a rather discrete surface). But given that the Braille pad should be used by blind people, their specific cognitive abilities should be under consideration when developing assistive technology.
In this regard other approaches fall short as well: In the BMWi funded project
Hyperbraille a pin-matrix display has been developed that works as a composition of hundrets of electro-mechanical piezo benders which raise the pins to form one
sampled, discrete image. Some years ago, there was a NSF funded project at John Hopkins University (2007-2009) advancing a dynamic electronic surface (on a polymer basis as well), but the development seems to have ceased. The EU-project NOMS (2010-2013) works on electroactive polymers hydraulics to promote materials & new production technologies for the interaction with a discrete surface (see articles in Wired and Scientific America). Other projects care about navigation support for the blind, but are not primarily focussed on technology: ENABLED (2004-2007), HAPTIMAP (2008-2012) and Nav4Blind - all of them are interrelated. Other technologies like laser lithography might become interesting once established for home use and the production of appropriate sized objects.
Displaying an image as tactile version on a Braille pad does not
necessarily mean that the users understand that representation of the
world. What catched my attention in this regard is the design decission to generate a 3d representation on the tactile pad. What for? Unfortunately nothing is said about this aspect in the article and there is no other material available about the project. Most blind people I spoke to were not interested in the heights of buildings. In some cases the inclination of the pavement might be interesting to orientate oneself. But I doubt that any tactile display listed above is able to represent this, let alone the ability to read thus information of these displays. In general, the abstractions must be understandable, i.e. matching the cognitive abilities and the specialities of tactile processing. That is what my PhD project is aiming for: cognitively-adequate tactile orientation maps.
The initially mentioned ISIR at the Université Pierre et Marie Curie is consortium member in the EU-project Assistive Technology Rapid Integration & Construction Set (AsTeRICS) as well. It hosts a group on interaction and describes itself as being involved in cognitive science.
Unfortunately this expertise seems to be underrepresented in the
current work. ISIR might have the opportunity to push cognitive
consideration in the project the institute is involved in. But the same seems to be true for most EU-projects in the 7th framework: they are technology driven and put cognitive consideration as an optional add-on at the end of the development cycle. I think we can learn from Human-Computer-Interaction here: Until approx. the 1980th most development was technology driven (then the success of the Mac brought good design and usability to the attention of people). From the 1990th usability was considered a major factor of the customers' acceptance and 15 years later the even wider concept of user experience had settled in the minds of designers, developers and marketeers. The focus has shifted from technology to human-centred functionality to personality. In the domain of tactile displays we are now in the phase of technology-focussed development. Some people will realize that there must be a shift towards human-centred and cognitive aspects as people won't accept (and will not buy) technology without these considerations taken into account.
Note: see also my recent post on Developments in Tactile Interfaces
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