Abstract
This paper describes an interaction concept for persons with visual impairments to explore digital maps. Mobile map applications like Google Maps have become an important instrument for navigation and exploration. However, existing map applications are highly visually oriented, making them inaccessible to users with visual impairments. This ongoing research project aims to develop an accessible digital map application in which information is presented in a non-visual way. Analysis of existing market solutions shows that information retention is highest when a combination of different output modalities is used. As a result, a prototype app has been created using three major non-visual modalities: Voice output (speech synthesis), everyday sounds (e.g. car traffic), and vibration feedback. User tests were performed, and based on the test results, the Touch Explorer app was developed. Initial usability tests are described in this paper.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Global data on visual impairment 2010. WHO (2012). http://www.who.int/blindness/Globaldatafinalforweb.pdf. Accessed 10 Oct 2012
Holloway, L., Marriott, K., Butler, M.: Accessible maps for the blind: comparing 3D printed models with tactile graphics. In: Cox, A., Perry, M. (eds.) CHI 2018 - Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Montréal, QC, Canada, 21–26 April 2018. Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), New York (2018). https://doi.org/10.1145/3173574.3173772
Ducasse, J., Brock, A.M., Jouffrais, C.: Accessible interactive maps for visually impaired users. In: Pissaloux, E., Velázquez, R. (eds.) Mobility of Visually Impaired People, pp. 537–584. Springer, Cham (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-54446-5_17
Zeng, L., Weber, G.: Accessible maps for the visually impaired. In: Proceedings of IFIP INTERACT 2011, Workshop on ADDW, pp. 54–60 (2011)
Poppinga, B., Pielot, M., Magnusson, C., Rassmus-Gröhn, K.: TouchOver map: audio-tactile exploration of interactive maps. In: MobileHCI 2011, pp. 545–550 (2011)
OpenStreetMaps. https://www.openstreetmap.org/
Darvishy, A., Hutter, H.-P., Frei, J.: Making mobile map applications accessible for visually impaired people. In: Ahram, T., Taiar, R., Colson, S., Choplin, A. (eds.) IHIET 2019. AISC, vol. 1018, pp. 396–400. Springer, Cham (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25629-6_61
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Darvishy, A., Hutter, HP., Grossenbacher, M., Merz, D. (2020). Touch Explorer: Exploring Digital Maps for Visually Impaired People. In: Miesenberger, K., Manduchi, R., Covarrubias Rodriguez, M., Peňáz, P. (eds) Computers Helping People with Special Needs. ICCHP 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12376. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58796-3_50
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58796-3_50
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-58795-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-58796-3
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)