Designing interfaces to make information more tangible for visually impaired people

Abstract

This paper introduces our two research projects. One is to propose the graphic representation method with touch and sound as the universal designed touch screen interface for visually impaired people. Another is to investigate the good design of the collaborative work environment of the visually impaired. The proposed graphic representation method and interfaces are basic techniques for developing plug-ins which help blind people to use ordinary mass-produced computer devices with touch screens, such as smartphones and iPads. Our idea is so simple that musical scales enable users to trace graphics by their fingers and to memorize their position on the touch screen. Our recent progress including digital textbook application for visually impaired children is also reported. To investigate the design of the collaborative work environment, we have developed the collaborative music composition application with a tangible interface using daily goods that would attract the attention of both visually impaired and sighted people, and to induce collaborative communication among them. After evaluating this application, we focused our interest on the moment in which the visually impaired people are having fun, and on the factor of the excitement and concentration. This paper introduces our experimental system, which is a shooting game application without visual information, to investigate the factor of the excitement and concentration of the collaboration between visually impaired people. Recent analysis results of the collaboration are reported.