Sensory Augmentation for the Blind

“These predict that perception results from processes of the body that is interacting with the environment (for the philosophical and scientific ramifications, see Dewey, 1896; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Gibson, 1979;Varela et al., 1991; Clark, 1997; Noë, 2004; Thompson, 2007; Engel, 2010).”

“These predict that perception results from processes of the body that is interacting with the environment (for the philosophical and scientific ramifications, see Dewey, 1896; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Gibson, 1979;Varela et al., 1991; Clark, 1997; Noë, 2004; Thompson, 2007; Engel, 2010).”

“This is fully compatible with the framework of sensorimotor contingencies (O’Regan and Noë, 2001).”

“These predict that perception results from processes of the body that is interacting with the environment (for the philosophical and scientific ramifications, see Dewey, 1896; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Gibson, 1979;Varela et al., 1991; Clark, 1997; Noë, 2004; Thompson, 2007; Engel, 2010).”

“The ability to return straight to the point of origin is found in several animal species (e.g., desert ants and geese; Mittelstaedt and Mittelstaedt, 1982; Wehner and Wehner, 1986 cited in Loomis et al., 1993), but has not been found in humans as a general occurrence.”

“These predict that perception results from processes of the body that is interacting with the environment (for the philosophical and scientific ramifications, see Dewey, 1896; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Gibson, 1979;Varela et al., 1991; Clark, 1997; Noë, 2004; Thompson, 2007; Engel, 2010).”

“Indeed sensory substitution devices follow this line of thought and use a human–machine interface that provides visual information via a non-visual modality, through auditory, or tactile cues (Bach-yRita et al., 1969, 1998; Amedi et al., 2007; Hanneton et al., 2010).”

“Indeed, several groups investigated sensory substitution in blind subjects, trying to re-establish a sensory modality that has been lost by utilizing another one (Bach-y-Rita et al., 1998; Arno et al., 2001; Ptito et al., 2005; Renier et al., 2005; Amedi et al., 2010).”

“Homing is viewed as a tool to access the subject’s ability to do path integration based solely on idiothetic cues, i.e., based on internal representations (Nagel et al., 2005).”

“Notably, this result has only been found in subjects who were allowed to actively explore their environment with the device (Bach-y-Rita, 1972, 2004).”

“Indeed, several groups investigated sensory substitution in blind subjects, trying to re-establish a sensory modality that has been lost by utilizing another one (Bach-y-Rita et al., 1998; Arno et al., 2001; Ptito et al., 2005; Renier et al., 2005; Amedi et al., 2010).”

“Indeed, several groups investigated sensory substitution in blind subjects, trying to re-establish a sensory modality that has been lost by utilizing another one (Bach-y-Rita et al., 1998; Arno et al., 2001; Ptito et al., 2005; Renier et al., 2005; Amedi et al., 2010).”

“These predict that perception results from processes of the body that is interacting with the environment (for the philosophical and scientific ramifications, see Dewey, 1896; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Gibson, 1979;Varela et al., 1991; Clark, 1997; Noë, 2004; Thompson, 2007; Engel, 2010).”

“a human–machine interface that provides visual information via a non-visual modality, through auditory, or tactile cues (Bach-yRita et al., 1969, 1998; Amedi et al., 2007; Hanneton et al., 2010).”

“These predict that perception results from processes of the body that is interacting with the environment (for the philosophical and scientific ramifications, see Dewey, 1896; Merleau-Ponty, 1962; Gibson, 1979;Varela et al., 1991; Clark, 1997; Noë, 2004; Thompson, 2007; Engel, 2010).”

“[75] used a tactile belt consisting of 30 equidistantly spaced tactors in combination with a digital compass to display the direction of magnetic north by continually vibrating the closest tactor aligned with the magnetic north direction.”

“See (Bach-y-Rita, 1972; Meijer, 1992; Capelle et al., 1998; Hanneton et al., 2010; Williams et al., 2011; Kärcher et al., 2012; LevyTzedek et al., 2012; Abboud et al., 2014) for examples of such devices and (Maidenbaum and Amedi, 2012; Maidenbaum, 2014) for recent reviews on the use of such…”

“Kärcher et al. (2012) argue that even though sensory substitution devices can be beneficial for navigation and orientation in the environment, they place a strain on attentional resources, which may detract from attention paid to other aspects of the environment.”

“FeelSpace belt The technical aspects of the belt have been described before in detail (Kärcher et al., 2012).”

“The results revealed significant performance improvement for the late-blind participant after the training period with the feelSpace belt [29].”

“2003) and that response biases exist when identifying spatial locations via a tactile display (Van erp 2005; Kärcher et al. 2012; Kaspar et al. 2014).”

“Beyond vision, similar devices have been used in a variety of other sensory modalities, including auditory–visual substitution, 7 tactile-vestibular (balance) substitution,(8) and a sensory augmentation belt that signals the direction of magnetic north.(9) All of these devices highlight the adaptive nature and remarka…”

“Several investigations were conducted to study the perceptual learning that took place in trained participants with the device (Nagel et al., 2005; Kärcher et al., 2012; Kaspar et al., 2014).”

“…research has shown benefits for receiving tactile spatial cues especially in contexts in which little or no visual information is available (Kärcher et al., 2012), the visual sensory modality is occupied with a demanding task (Sklar and Sarter, 1999; Calhoun et al., 2002), or in contexts…”

“This sort of process has been coined, curiously, sensory augmentation (see Nagel et al. 2005, Kärcher et al. 2012), making even more explicit the relation between the processes of substitution and augmentation.”

“In one study, blind participants who had worn the belt for an extended period of time were led around a complex path and asked to point back to the start of the path (Kärcher, Fenzlaff, Hartmann, Nagel, & König, 2012).”

“Sensory augmentation can also include the creation of a additional ‘sense’ by presenting information about the aspects of the world that are outside human perceptual capabilities, such as a per ception of magnetic north [7].”

“For instance, Aesthetic Laborations (A-labs) is a sensitizing approach which treats cognitive and bodily experience as entwined [1, 28].”

“The additional senses provided by augmentation can be used to boost the spatial awareness of people with impaired vision [10], [11], or for people operating in environments where visual sensing is compromised such as smokedfilled buildings [2], [3], [12].”

“For the latter, such audio cues, particularly when delivered through headphones, can obscure or distract from sounds of the natural environment [5].”

“For VI persons, screens are inaccessible and headphones can limit the ability of users to notice audible hazards, appreciate their surroundings, localize using landmarks (such as a fountain or busy intersection), or be socially engaged with others [26]–[28].”

“A similar study providing vibrotactile cues in the north direction, presented better navigation performance in real world environments [8].”

“For many decades, researchers have considered the potential of haptic devices as navigation tools, with a focus on using vibration-based stimuli from eccentric rotating mass ( ERM ) actuators to indicate directions to walk or obstacles to avoid [19, 24, 35, 38, 40].”

“Belt design and technology have been described in detail before (Nagel et al., 2005; Kärcher et al., 2012).”

“…work has shown and as we report here, participants easily report the direction being indicated by the compass, showing little difficulty incorporating an embodied and previously unfamiliar cue of an abstract property into concrete spatial information (Kärcher et al., 2012; König et al., 2016).”

“The stick was used to exclude the possibility that movements of the experimenter give the participant directional cues [35].”

“As previously discussed, the representation of abstract or visual concepts via the low-bandwidth nature of touch is challenging and may be associated with long training times, as users learn to interpret dense data [6][20][21].”

“the blind as sensory augmentation (Kärcher et al., 2012), or as more general as ‘mind-enhancing tools’ (Auvray & Myin, 2009, p.”

“However, their use is limited to familiar environments (Kärcher et al., 2012) or museums (Ghiani, Leporini & Paternò, 2009).”

“Alternatively, directions and warning signals can be provided by haptic feedback in the form of vibrational stimuli 17–23 .”

“…where the focus is the development of expert abilities, or the extent to which the user internalises the stimuli provided by the device, (Auvray et al., 2007; Kärcher et al., 2012) or where the intention was to produce effects that would persist after using the device (Robinson et al., 2009).”

“understanding of brain organization and neural adaptation during adulthood, but they also carry practical implications for assistive technologies (Karcher et al., 2012) and brain/machine interfaces.”

“Moreover, these studies were challenged with small sample sizes, for instance, due to time-intensive experimental procedures [41,43] or a focus on specific test subjects [40,46].”

“Moreover, many blind people highly rely on their sense of hearing for the perception of their surroundings and even navigate by using human echolocation [7].”

“Examples include tactile feedback to teach arm motions [2], cueing workers on important environmental events [3], improving task dexterity [4], providing feedback from prostheses [5], assisting in navigation [6], [7], teleoperation [8], [9], and the list goes on.”

“The first studies in which ‘ normal ’ perception is being augmented are yet to deliver any insights into the plastic processes triggered by sensory augmentation [5, 6, 10].”

“However, designing usable and acceptable sensory augmentation technology is challenging in itself (Kärcher et al., 2012; Kristjánsson et al., 2016).”

“Finally, it might be interesting to investigate the usefulness of the NaviEar as a prosthesis for navigation in blind people (cf. Johnson & Higgins, 2006; K¨archer et al., 2012; Kupers & Ptito, 2004; Maidenbaum, Hanassy, et al., 2014; Poirier et al., 2007).”

“The feelSpace vibrotactile belt uses a ring-shaped array of tactors around the waist to continuously indicate magnetic north [156].”

“Although prior research on rehabilitation for visual impairments included mobility, many studies relied on qualitative or subjective measures (e.g., surveys), or did not focus on skills necessary for collision avoidance [10,21].”

“1B, employed in our study is a prototype derived from the feelSpace naviBelt 9 and the technical aspects are documented in detail in a previous publication 34 .”

“Fourth, long-term training with the feelSpace belt has previously been shown to lead to perceptual changes to some extent [14-16].”

“At the same time, we can refer to previous studies that align with our findings of perceptual changes and emotional states induced by the feelSpace belt (2, 3, 21).”

“impaired people who use tactile assistance can feel safe in unfamiliar situations and better understand their surroundings with some time to learn and train [11].”

“Such physiological and perceptual changes observed in sighted and blind subjects are compatible with the theories of embodied cognition [14-16].”

“Navigation systems that provide cues via touch or audition have seen practical uptake in mobility training of blind users [5].”

“The bracelet design is based on feelSpace ’ s naviBelt (K € archer et al., 2012) which assists the visually impaired with wayfinding by using motor vibrations.”

“For example, a haptic belt-based sensory augmentation aid was tested with a single user over a long period of time [23].”