TY - JOUR
T1 - A Survey on Outdoor Navigation Applications for People With Visual Impairments
AU - El-Taher, Fatma El Zahraa
AU - Miralles-Pechuan, Luis
AU - Courtney, Jane
AU - Millar, Kristina
AU - Smith, Chantelle
AU - McKeever, Susan
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2013 IEEE.
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Outdoor navigation remains a challenging activity for People with Visual Impairments (PVI). Having examined the current literature, we conclude that there are very few publications providing a nuanced understanding of how PVI undertake a journey in an outdoor environment and what are their main challenges and obstacles. This is a critical step towards developing robust solutions that meet the requirements of this user group. We undertook a questionnaire-based study with the National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) and 49 PVI. According to the feedback from our questionnaire, current journey navigation apps do not provide PVI with sufficient information about traffic lights, crossroads, and physical obstacles to support a satisfactory interaction. Our study reveals key aspects of how PVI interact with outdoor navigation applications. Critical gaps exist, for example, over 63% of respondents indicated they had suffered an injury on at least one previous occasion when navigating outdoors. Based on the questionnaire feedback, we present a solution covering the main aspects of outdoor navigation for PVI. Our work aims to contribute to the improvement of outdoor navigation applications for PVI in the future.
AB - Outdoor navigation remains a challenging activity for People with Visual Impairments (PVI). Having examined the current literature, we conclude that there are very few publications providing a nuanced understanding of how PVI undertake a journey in an outdoor environment and what are their main challenges and obstacles. This is a critical step towards developing robust solutions that meet the requirements of this user group. We undertook a questionnaire-based study with the National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) and 49 PVI. According to the feedback from our questionnaire, current journey navigation apps do not provide PVI with sufficient information about traffic lights, crossroads, and physical obstacles to support a satisfactory interaction. Our study reveals key aspects of how PVI interact with outdoor navigation applications. Critical gaps exist, for example, over 63% of respondents indicated they had suffered an injury on at least one previous occasion when navigating outdoors. Based on the questionnaire feedback, we present a solution covering the main aspects of outdoor navigation for PVI. Our work aims to contribute to the improvement of outdoor navigation applications for PVI in the future.
KW - Accessibility
KW - assistive technology
KW - outdoor navigation
KW - sensory substitution devices
KW - users with blindness or visual impairment
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85148941008&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/ACCESS.2023.3244073
DO - 10.1109/ACCESS.2023.3244073
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85148941008
SN - 2169-3536
VL - 11
SP - 14647
EP - 14666
JO - IEEE Access
JF - IEEE Access
ER -