Spatial Reading System for Individuals with Blindness
| dc.contributor.author | Elglaly, Yasmine Nader Mohamed | en |
| dc.contributor.committeechair | Quek, Francis K. H. | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Ehrich, Roger W. | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Gracanin, Denis | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Smith-Jackson, Tonya L. | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Rizk, Mohamed Rizk Mohamed | en |
| dc.contributor.department | Computer Science | en |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2013-05-07T08:00:25Z | en |
| dc.date.available | 2013-05-07T08:00:25Z | en |
| dc.date.issued | 2013-05-06 | en |
| dc.description.abstract | In this research we introduce a novel reading system that enables Individuals with Blindness<br />or Severe Visual Impairment (IBSVI) to have equivalent spatial reading experience to their<br />sighted counterparts, in terms of being able to engage in different reading strategies e.g.<br />scanning, skimming, and active reading. IBSVI are enabled to read in a self-paced manner<br />with spatial access to the original layout of any electronic text document. This system<br />renders text on iPad-type devices, and reads aloud each word touched by the user\'s finger.<br />The user could move her finger smoothly along the lines to read continuously with the<br />support of tactile landmarks. A tactile overlay on the iPad screen helps IBSVI to navigate<br />a page, furnishing a framework of tactile landmarks to give IBSVI a sense of place on the<br />page. As the user moves her finger along the tangible pattern of the overlay, the text on the<br />screen that is touched is rendered audibly to speech. The system supports IBSVI to develop<br />and maintain a cognitive map of the structure and the layout of the page. IBSVI are enabled<br />to fuse audio, tactile landmarks, and spatial information in order to read.<br />The system\'s initial design is founded on a theoretical hypothesis. A participatory design<br />approach with IBSVI consultants was then applied to refine the initial design. The re"fined<br />design was tested in a usability study, which revealed two major issues with the tested<br />design. These issues are related to the lack of instant feedback from the system (psycho-<br />motorical problem), and the lack of conveying the semantic level of the page structure.<br />We adapted the reader design to solve the usability problems. The improved design was<br />tested in an experience sampling study. The results showed a leap in the system usability.<br />IBSVI participants successfully self-paced read spatial text. Further reading support was<br />then added to the system to improve the user experience while reading and interacting with<br />the system. We tested the latest design of the reader system with respect to its featured<br />function of enabling self-paced reading and re-finding information. A decomposition study<br />was conducted to evaluate the main components of the system; the tactile overlay, and the<br />intelligent active reading support. The results showed that both components are required<br />to achieve the best performance in terms of efficiency, effectiveness, and spatial perception.<br />We conducted an evaluation study to compare our reader system to the state-of-the-art<br />iBook with VoiceOver. The results show that our reader system is more effective than iBook<br />with VoiceOver in finding previously read information and in estimating the layout of the<br />page, implying that IBSVI were able to construct a cognitive map for the pages they read,<br />and perform advanced reading strategies. Our goal is to to enable IBSVI to access digital<br />reading materials effectively, so that they may have equal learning opportunities as their<br />sighted counterparts. | en |
| dc.description.degree | Ph. D. | en |
| dc.format.medium | ETD | en |
| dc.identifier.other | vt_gsexam:479 | en |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/10919/22016 | en |
| dc.publisher | Virginia Tech | en |
| dc.rights | In Copyright | en |
| dc.rights.uri | http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ | en |
| dc.subject | Active reading | en |
| dc.subject | Audio rendering | en |
| dc.subject | Spatial cognition | en |
| dc.subject | Multimodality | en |
| dc.subject | Blindness | en |
| dc.subject | Touch devices | en |
| dc.subject | Assistive technology | en |
| dc.title | Spatial Reading System for Individuals with Blindness | en |
| dc.type | Dissertation | en |
| thesis.degree.discipline | Computer Science and Applications | en |
| thesis.degree.grantor | Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University | en |
| thesis.degree.level | doctoral | en |
| thesis.degree.name | Ph. D. | en |