Empowering People with Vision Impairments through Accessible Wearable Computing

在加拿大，有150万人被认为有视力障碍。视觉障碍（PVI）患者经常使用辅助技术来获得独立，但他们仍然面临着一些障碍，使他们无法充分参与社会。该提案的重点是通过设计无障碍的可穿戴计算，为PVI社区增加人机交互的可访问性，这有助于与政策制定者合作创建一个更具包容性的社会。我的研究计划主要集中在三个短期目标上。首先，我的目标是通过PVI提高在线工具的可访问性。其次，我将通过一个模块化的可穿戴工具包，促进可穿戴原型与PVI的远程协同设计。我将探索制造技术来开发此工具包，并专门研究一个协作组件，其中两个PVI可以使用形状改变技术在同一项目上远程协作。最后，我的工作将通过可穿戴原型使PVI能够独立进行游戏活动，支持对独立玩棋盘和纸牌游戏感兴趣的PVI，并使PVI能够自己练习乐器。我的研究在于人机交互，可访问性和可穿戴计算的交叉点。我认识到残疾人的专业知识，通过使用共同设计方法，研究人员和设计师与有生活经验的人一起工作。到2026年，人们预测可穿戴技术产业的价值将超过2600亿美元，尽管许多残疾人被抛在后面。该项目证明了新颖的体现，可穿戴和有形的用户界面，为残疾人和建立战略，使PVI社区的设计过程的一部分。这项工作鼓励公司招募PVI到他们的设计团队，如设计师，开发人员和其他角色。在为残疾人设计时，确保他们的意见和经验在设计中得到考虑至关重要。该研究计划还将为无障碍可穿戴设备和电子纺织品的政策创新奠定基础，因为加拿大目前的无障碍政策通常侧重于数字资产。最后，这项工作将为可穿戴设备和电子纺织品提供基于证据的设计规范，这些规范可应用于各种环境，并为其设计提供评估标准，以帮助评估未来的工作。

In Canada, there are 1.5 million people who identify as having a visual impairment. People with visual impairments (PVI) often use assistive technologies to gain independence, yet they still face several barriers that exclude them from fully participating in society. This proposal focuses on increasing human-computer interaction accessibility for the PVI community, through the design of accessible wearable computing, which can help create a more inclusive society in collaboration with policymakers. My research program focuses on three short-term goals. First, I aim to improve the accessibility of online tools with PVI. Second, I will facilitate remote co-design of wearable prototypes with PVI through a modular wearable toolkit. I will explore fabrication techniques to develop this toolkit, and specifically investigate a collaborative component where two PVI could remotely collaborate on the same project using shape-changing technologies. Finally, my work will empower PVI for independence in playful activities through wearable prototypes, to support PVI who are interested in independently playing board and card games and give the ability for PVI to practise musical instruments on their own. My research lies at the intersection of human computer interaction, accessibility, and wearable computing. I recognize the expertise of people with disability by using co-design methodologies where researchers and designers to work alongside people with lived experiences. By 2026, people predict that the wearable technology industry will be worth more than $260 billion, though many people with disabilities are being left behind. The project proves novel embodied, wearable, and tangible user interfaces for people with disabilities and builds strategies to enable the PVI community to be part of the design process. The work encourages companies to recruit PVI to their design teams like designers, developers, and other roles in their businesses. It is critical when designing for people with disabilities to make sure their opinions and experiences are considered in the design. The research program will also lay the groundwork for policy innovation for accessible wearables and e-textiles as the current accessibility policy in Canada often focuses on digital assets. Finally, the work will provide evidence-based design specifications for wearables and e-textiles that can be applied in various contexts and evaluation criteria for their designs which can assist in evaluating future work.