Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis of Barriers to Travel by Persons with Visual Impairments and its Mitigation through Accessible Signage
Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis of Barriers to Travel by Persons with Visual Impairments and its Mitigation through Accessible Signage
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对视力障碍者出行障碍的定量和定性分析以及通过无障碍标牌缓解障碍
DOI：
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发表时间：
2004
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
R. Golledge
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
James R. Marston;R. Golledge
不经意的观察和常识表明，对于有视力障碍的人来说，寻路和旅行可能是困难和耗时的。研究人员仍然对各种任务的不同难度以及它们如何影响旅行和活动行为知之甚少。本文总结了一个“现实生活中”的现场实验，在一个大型的城市终端，30名盲人参与者进行旅行和过境任务，使用他们的常规导航技能，也当使用听觉标牌技术。测试前的访谈显示，家庭以外的活动参与率较低，在执行许多必要的过境任务时难度很高，这导致很少发生为节省旅行时间而进行转移。现场测试数据表明，使用通过听觉标志获得的额外线索的人能够更快地完成任务，错误更少，他人的帮助更少，安全程度更高。测试后的评估表明，当提供了可访问的环境线索，运输任务不再被评为困难。这群人预计会参加更多的户外活动，更频繁地旅行，去更多的地方，他们预计会比现在做更多的转移，他们对这个环境的空间知识和通过它抄近路的能力都有了很大的提高。对常规旅行和有听觉线索的旅行的比较表明，参与者认为额外的线索会大大增加他们的旅行选择并且减轻了在没有视觉的情况下旅行所固有的许多问题。最后，一个“相对访问措施”进行了讨论，经验得出的难度为各种类型的寻路活动。综合起来，这些数据有力地证明，环境中缺乏无障碍提示可能导致活动和旅行受限，而增加无障碍提示将大大提高视力障碍者的生活和生产力。
Casual observation and common sense reveal that wayfinding and travel can be difficult and time consuming for persons with visual impairments. Researchers still have little understanding of what the various degrees of difficulty are for various tasks, and how they affect travel and activity behavior. This paper summarizes a “real-life” field experiment at a large urban terminal where 30 blind participants performed travel and transit tasks using their regular navigation skills and also when using auditory signage technology. Pre-test interviews showed a low rate of activity participation outside the home, and a high degree of difficulty when performing many necessary transit tasks, which lead to a low occurrence of making transfers to save travel time. The field test data showed that people using the additional cues obtained through auditory signage were able to complete the tasks much faster, with less errors, less assistance from others, and with a higher degree of safety. Post-test evaluations showed that, when provided with accessible environmental cues, transit tasks were no longer rated as difficult. This group anticipated participating in many more activities outside the home and traveling more often and to more places, they anticipated making many more transfers than currently made, and they exhibited highly improved spatial knowledge of this environment and the ability to make shortcuts through it. Comparisons between regular travel and travel with auditory cues showed that participants thought the additional cues would greatly increase their travel options and mitigate many of the problems inherent in travel without sight. Finally, a “relative access measure” is discussed to empirically derive the degree of difficulty for various types of wayfinding activities. Combined, these data strongly argue the case that it is the lack of accessible cues in the environment that can cause limited access to activities and travel, and that the addition of accessible cues would greatly enhance the lives and productivity of persons with visual impairments.