Assessment of feedback modalities for wearable visual aids in blind mobility

Aminat Adebiyi; Paige Sorrentino; Shadi Bohlool; Carey Zhang; Mort Arditti; Gregory Goodrich; James D Weiland

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0170531

Assessment of feedback modalities for wearable visual aids in blind mobility

PLoS One. 2017 Feb 9;12(2):e0170531. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0170531. eCollection 2017.

Authors

Aminat Adebiyi¹, Paige Sorrentino², Shadi Bohlool¹, Carey Zhang^{1

3}, Mort Arditti⁴, Gregory Goodrich⁵, James D Weiland^{1

6}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, United States of America.
² Department of Biological Sciences, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, United States of America.
³ Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, United States of America.
⁴ University of Southern California Eye Institute, Los Angeles, California, United States of America.
⁵ Psychology Service and Western Blind Rehabilitation Center, Veterans Affairs, Palo Alto, California, United States of America.
⁶ Department of Ophthalmology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, United States of America.

Abstract

Sensory substitution devices engage sensory modalities other than vision to communicate information typically obtained through the sense of sight. In this paper, we examine the ability of subjects who are blind to follow simple verbal and vibrotactile commands that allow them to navigate a complex path. A total of eleven visually impaired subjects were enrolled in the study. Prototype systems were developed to deliver verbal and vibrotactile commands to allow an investigator to guide a subject through a course. Using this mode, subjects could follow commands easily and navigate significantly faster than with their cane alone (p <0.05). The feedback modes were similar with respect to the increased speed for course completion. Subjects rated usability of the feedback systems as "above average" with scores of 76.3 and 90.9 on the system usability scale.

Publication types

Clinical Trial

MeSH terms

Audiovisual Aids*
Blindness*
Female
Humans
Locomotion*
Male
Middle Aged

Grants and funding

This work was supported by an Unrestricted Departmental grant from Research to Prevent Blindness, New York, NY 10017, https://www.rpbusa.org/rpb/?; and U.S. Army Medical Research & Materiel Command (USAMRMC) and the Telemedicine & Advanced Technology Research Center (TATRC), at Fort Detrick, MD, under Contract Number W81XWH-10-2-0076, http://mrmc.amedd.army.mil/. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.