Indoor navigation by blind people: behaviors and challenges in unfamiliar spaces and buildings
Abstract
A number of visually impaired people suffer from navigation-related activities due to mishaps that discourage them from going out for social activities and interactions. In contrast to outdoors, traveling inside public spaces is a different story, as many environmental cues cannot be used and have their own set of difficulties. Some technologies have come into play in helping these people to have freedom in navigation (e.g., accessible map, indoor navigation systems, and wearable computing devices). However, technologies like accessible maps or indoor navigation systems are insufficient to fulfill the independent navigation gap as additional information is required (obstacles, barriers, and accessibility). To promote indoor navigation and create better use of technologies for visually impaired people, it is essential to understand the facts and actual problems that they experience, and what behaviors and strategies they use to overcome any problems; these are the concerns that led to this study. In all, 30 visually impaired people and 15 experts were recruited to give an interview about the behavior and strategies used to navigate indoor spaces, especially public spaces, for example, universities, hospitals, malls, museums, and airports. The findings from this study reveal that navigating inside buildings and public spaces full of unfamiliar features is too difficult to attempt the first time for a number of reasons, reducing their confidence in independent navigation.
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People who are blind tend to spend a lot of time indoors.
“since people who are blind tend to spend a lot of time indoors (Jeamwatthanachai et al., 2019)”
From Towards a <i>Smart Bionic Eye</i> : AI-powered artificial vision for the treatment of incurable blindness (2022) · cites this paper as Jeamwatthanachai et al., 2019
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An Outdoor Navigation Assistance System for Visually Impaired People in Public Transportation
Martinez-Cruz, S., Morales-Hernandez, L. A., Perez-Soto, G. I., Benitez-Rangel, J. P., & Camarillo-Gomez, K. A. (2021) · IEEE Access · doi:10.1109/access.2021.3111544 · Cited by 47 · see citing works
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“In addition, since people who are blind tend to spend a lot of time indoors (Jeamwatthanachai et al 2019), it is not outlandish to assume that a Smart Bionic Eye could be shipped with a central desktop computer that would handle most of the computationally expensive processing while communicating…”
Chen, K., Huang, Y., Chen, Y., Zhong, H., Lin, L., Wang, L., & Wu, K. (2022) · Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies · doi:10.1145/3550282 · Cited by 12 · see citing works
- Authors
- Jeamwatthanachai, W., Wald, M., & Wills, G.
- Affiliations
- University of Southampton (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Jeamwatthanachai, Watthanasak
- Venue
- British Journal of Visual Impairment
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2019-05
- Volume
- 37
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 140-153
- ISSN
- 0264-6196 (ISSN-L)
- 1744-5809
- OpenAlex
- W2907507865
- Cited by
- 105
- References
- 13
- Citations by year
- 2026: 14 · 2025: 22 · 2024: 20 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 1
- FWCI
- 18.61
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- British Journal of Visual Impairment (publishedVersion)
- ePrints Soton (University of Southampton) (acceptedVersion)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › Occupational Therapy › Assistive Technology in Communication and Mobility
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Tactile and Sensory Interactions
- Social Sciences › Human Factors and Ergonomics › Digital Accessibility for Disabilities
- Keywords
- indoor navigation, visually impaired people, blind people, independent navigation, navigation strategies, public space, buildings, accessibility, barriers, assistive technology, wearable computing, accessible maps
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