Melissa Dawe

Socio-technical environments supporting people with cognitive disabilities using public transportation

Public transportation systems are among the most ubiquitous and complex large-scale systems found in modern society. For those unable to drive such as people with cognitive disabilities, these systems are essential gateways for participation in community activities, socialization, and independence. To understand the magnitude and scope of this national problem, we highlight deficiencies identified in an international study by the Transportation Research Board of the National Research Council and present specific cognitive barriers identified in empirical studies of transportation systems in several U.S. cities.An interdisciplinary team of HCI researchers, urban transportation planners, commercial technologists, and assistive care specialists are now collaborating on the Mobility-for-All project to create architectures and prototypes that support those with cognitive disabilities and their caregivers. We have grounded our research and design efforts using a distributed cognition framework. We have derived requirements for our designs by analyzing “how things are” for individuals with cognitive disabilities who learn and use public transportation systems. We present a socio-technical architecture that has three components: a) a personal travel assistant that uses real-time Global Positioning Systems data from the bus fleet to deliver just-in-time prompts; b) a mobile prompting client and a prompting script configuration tool for caregivers; and c) a monitoring system that collects real-time task status from the mobile client and alerts the support community of potential problems. We then describe a phased community-centered assessment approach that begins at the design stage and continues to be integrated throughout the project.This research has broad implications for designing more human-centered transportation systems that are universally accessible for other disenfranchised communities such as the elderly or nonnative speaker. This project presents an “in-the-world” research opportunity that challenges our understanding about mobile human computer interactions with ubiquitous, context-aware computing architectures in noisy, uncontrolled environments; personalization and user modeling techniques; and the design of universally accessible interfaces for complex systems through participatory design processes.This article provides both a near-term vision and an architecture for transportation systems that are socially inclusive, technologically appealing, and easier for everyone to use.

Desperately seeking simplicity: how young adults with cognitive disabilities and their families adopt assistive technologies

A surprisingly high percentage of assistive technology devices (35% or more) are purchased, but not successfully adopted. Through semi-structured interviews with a dozen families, we have come to understand the role technology plays in the lives of families who have a young adult with cognitive disabilities, and how families find, acquire, and use these technologies. This study addresses gaps in existing research and informs future efforts in assistive technology design. Design implications include the importance of simplicity not only in technology function but in configuration, documentation, maintenance, and upgrade or replacement; as well as the need for designers to use methods that consider the multiple individuals and stages involved in the technology adoption process.

Looking at digital library usability from a reuse perspective

The need for information systems to support the dissemination and reus e of educational resources has sparked a number of large-scale digital library efforts. This article describes usability findings from one such project - the Digital Library for Earth System Education (DLESE) - focusing on its role in the process of educational resource reuse. Drawing upon a reuse model developed in the domain of software engineering, the reuse cycle is broken down into five stages: formulation of a reuse intention, location, comprehension, modification, and sharing. Using this model to analyze user studies in the DLESE project, several implications for library system design and library outreach activities are highlighted. One finding is that resource reuse occurs at different stages in the educational design process, and each stage imposes different and possibly conflicting requirements on digital library design. Another finding is that reuse is a distributed process across several artifacts, both within and outside of the library itself. In order for reuse to be successful, a usability line cannot be drawn at the library boundary, but instead must encompass both the library system and the educational resources themselves.

Understanding mobile phone requirements for young adults with cognitive disabilities

Mobile phones have transformed the way we communicate with friends and family, coordinate our daily activities, and organize our lives. For families with children with cognitive disabilities there is widespread hope, though not always fulfilled, that personal technologies - particularly mobile phones - can bring a dramatic increase in their childrens level of safety, independence, and social connectedness. In this research, we conducted semi-structured interviews with five families to understand the current patterns of remote communication among young adults with cognitive disabilities and their parental caregivers, and the role that remote communication played in increasing independence and safety. While some of the young adults used mobile phones and some did not, we identified common themes in requirements, patterns of use, and desires for an accessible mobile-phone based remote communication system. Requirements include the need for a simplified navigation menu with fewer options and a rugged handset and charger input. Families used mobile phones for safety check-ins and help getting un-stuck. While parents desired increased social involvement for their children, they observed that their children did not often chat with friends on the phone.

Let me show you what i want: engaging individuals with cognitive disabilities and their families in design

In this paper I describe an ongoing multi-stage, participatory design study with individuals with cognitive disabilities and their family caregivers. I use a technology probe to inspire families to co-design a picture-based remote communication system. The technology platform is a PDA.smart phone.. I will present early findings from this study and discuss how it was a successful approach to engage with individuals with significant cognitive disabilities as co-designers of their own technology.

Collaborative design with use case scenarios

Digital libraries, particularly those with a community-based governanc e structure, are best designed in a collaborative setting. In this paper, we compare our experience using two design methods: a Task-centered method that draws upon a groups strength for eliciting and formulating tasks, and a Use Case method that tends to require a focus on defining an explicit process for tasks. We discuss how these methods did and did not work well in a collaborative setting.

Caregivers, cost, and complexity: understanding technology usage by individuals with cognitive disabilities

This research employs ethnographic and user-centered design methods in a multi-phase study designed to uncover usability issues and evolving user needs through the design and extended use of a handheld remote communication system for individuals with cognitive disabilities. This extended abstract focuses on the findings from the first phase of the research, an interview study exploring issues around adoption and usage of technology by individuals with cognitive disabilities.

Creating Reusable Educational Components: Lessons from DLESE

Reuse of educational materials is integral to many educator tasks, from designing a course to preparing for a lab or class. We are studying the reuse of educational materials in the context of the Digital Library for Earth System Education (DLESE). DLESE is a community-owned and governed facility offering high-quality teaching and learning resources for Earth system education. Our studies build on a cognitive framework that posits that people engage in three cyclical processes—location, comprehension, and modification—when reusing resources from large digital repositories. Our formative evaluations and cataloging experiences in DLESE suggest that the ‘findability’ and reusability of community-created digital educational resources is highly dependent on the presentational and structural design of the resources themselves. Educational resource designers often do not develop components with reuse in mind, making it more difficult or impossible for other educators to find and use their material. We share the results of these studies to help educators create digital materials that are more easily shared and used by others. For example, we recommend that all resources clearly state the creators name and contact information; relevant copyright restrictions; the most significant date for the resource (specifying creation or revision); and the intended grade level.