Gill, John Martin, 1947- (1973) Design, production and evaluation of tactual maps for the blind. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

Preview

PDF WRAP_THESIS_Gill_1973.pdf - Requires a PDF viewer such as GSview, Xpdf or Adobe Acrobat Reader Download (12Mb)

Abstract

A computer-assisted system has been developed for the production of tactual mobility and orientation maps for the blind. The system involves using computer-aided design techniques to generate the input for a computer-controlled machine tool. Plastic copies are vacuum formed from an epoxy resin master. The main advantages of this system are quality, versatility and speed. Experimental studies have been undertaken on the tactual discriminability of areal, line and point symbols produced by this system. A further experiment studied the retention of meanings associated with fourteen tactual symbols and the ability of blind schoolchildren to locate these symbols on a map. A pilot study has been carried out on the acceptability of four design parameters: (i) Double and single representation of roads. (ii) Choice of plastic. (iii) Symbol elevation. (iv) Methods for marking road names. A number of tactual maps have been made for informal evaluation by a larger section of the blind community. As a result of this work a system has been evolved which can support further research in the general area of tactual representations, and which can also form the basis for a production unit to meet cone of the demands for this type of aid. It has proven possible to identify sets of symbols which may prove useful to the future design of these maps.

Item Type:	Thesis or Dissertation (PhD)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HV Social pathology. Social and public welfare T Technology > TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Maps for the blind, Blind -- Printing and writing systems, Computer-aided engineering
Date:	1973
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	School of Engineering
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Douce, John Leonard ;
Sponsors:	Medical Research Council (Great Britain) (MRC)
Description:	The hard copy of this thesis contains volume 2 made up of 4 tactual maps. Please see the official URL for details on how to access the full version.
Extent:	1 v. (various pagings)
Language:	eng
URI:	http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/id/eprint/4086

Request changes to a record

Actions (login required)

View Item