Advanced Spatiomotor Rehabilitation for Navigation in Blindness & Visual Impairment

先进的空间康复导航失明和视力障碍 摘要 我们提出了一种全新的多学科方法来进行失明和视觉导航训练， 损伤成功的导航需要发展一个准确和灵活的心理，或认知， 导航空间图和从海流到目标所需的航线轨迹图 位置.我们在前面开发的认知-动觉（C-K）康复训练 一个时期利用一种独特的形式盲记忆引导绘图发展认知映射到一个高水平 熟练程度。必须特别依赖这种心理地图（只有触觉和触觉支持）。 听觉输入），并有效地使用它们进行空间控制的能力，当视觉与其 失去了内置的空间功能。然而，在指导实践中存在着根本性的差距， 流动性（O&M），这是缺乏一个具体的重点，加强这些认知的根源， 空间活动，尽管他们对视力受损的导航的重要性是众所周知的。 因此，我们建议对这一问题采取严格的多学科办法， 空间康复、失明评估技术和脑功能领域，每一个都是重点 一个具体的目标。为了训练成功航行所需的空间认知能力，目前 该提案旨在将我们在前面开发的C-K康复训练的力量转化为 授予期间为手动操作域，以导航域。盲人和视力 受损的受训者将很快学会如何生成精确和稳定的触觉探索认知地图， 凸起的线条图像或触觉地图，以及如何使用形成的认知地图自信地引导两者 在地图尺度上绘制“手导航”，在宏观尺度上绘制全身盲导航。一旦 翻译为导航，我们的初步数据表明，这种有效和愉快的培训将迅速和 可持续地增强空间认知功能， 增强更一般的空间认知技能。 除了它的实际优势，培训也将作为一个有效的工具，驱动和研究 通过全面的全脑多模态脑成像， 平台如果没有快速有效的训练方案，这些神经可塑性很难正确研究， 这是以前没有的。综合考虑，研究计划将克服相对 扩大神经科学知识和实际失明康复方法之间的脱节。 所获得的知识将反过来为航行和其他方面的康复发展提供信息和帮助。 熟练程度和更一般的认知功能在盲人人群。 !

Advanced Spatiomotor Rehabilitation for Navigation in Blindness & Visual Impairment ABSTRACT We propose a radical new multidisciplinary approach to navigation training in blindness and visual impairment. Successful navigation requires the development of an accurate and flexible mental, or cognitive, map of the navigational space and of the route trajectory required to travel from the current to the target location. The Cognitive-Kinesthetic (C-K) Rehabilitation Training that we have developed in the preceding period utilizes a unique form of blind memory-guided drawing to develop cognitive mapping to a high level of proficiency. Particular reliance must be placed on such mental maps (supported only by tactile and auditory inputs), and on the ability to use them effectively for spatiomotor control, when vision with its built-in spatial functionality is lost. There is, however, a fundamental gap in the practice of Orientation and Mobility (O&M), which is the lack of a specific emphasis on enhancement of these cognitive roots of spatiomotor activity, despite their known importance for navigation in the visually impaired. We therefore propose a rigorous multidisciplinary approach to this issue, which lies at the intersection of the fields of spatiomotor rehabilitation, blindness assessment technologies, and brain function, each a focus of one Specific Aim. To train the spatial cognition abilities underlying successful navigation, the current proposal aims to translate the power of the C-K Rehabilitation Training, which we developed in the preceding grant period for the manual domain of operation, to the domain of navigation. The blind and visually impaired trainees will quickly learn how to generate precise and stable cognitive maps of haptically explored raised-line images or tactile maps, and how to use the formed cognitive maps to confidently guide both drawing ’hand navigation’ on a map-scale, and whole-body blind navigation on the macro-scale. Once translated to navigation, our preliminary data show that this efficient and enjoyable training will rapidly and sustainably enhance spatial cognition functions both for improved navigation performance and for enhancement of more general spatial cognitive skills. Beyond its practical advantages, the training will also serve as an efficient tool to drive and study training-based neuroplasticity mechanisms through a comprehensive whole-brain multimodal brain imaging platform. These neuroplastic are difficult to study properly without a rapid and effective training protocol, which has not previously been available. Taken together, the research program will overcome the relative disconnect between expanding neuroscience knowledge and approaches to practical blindness rehabilitation. The knowledge gained will in turn inform and benefit further rehabilitative developments, both in navigation proficiency and in more general cognitive function in the blind population. !