Rita Mátrai

Navigation methods of special needs users in multimedia systems

In todays information society, computer users frequently need to seek for information on home pages as well as to select among software functions. A well-designed interface is essential in order to find everything necessary and meet the requirements of both the average user and users with special needs. Proper placement of objects on the screen is important to decrease perception time. One of the well-known researchers of web ergonomics, Jakob Nielsen (2006) established in an eye-tracking experiment that users scan displayed homepages in an F shape. In the present project the task was to find similar shapes in a number of playful visual search games. Several multimedia tasks were developed for this investigation. Our experiments included normal users and users with intellectual disabilities. We tested whether the characteristic searching routes and navigation methods differed between normal users and those with intellectual disabilities. The results of this investigation can inform the design and position of graphical user interface elements.

Analysing the 2D, 3D and Web User Interface Navigation Structures of Normal Users and Users with Mild Intellectual Disabilities

Design questions of home pages are examined by numerous visual search experiments as well. However, in the majority of experiments only one target object has to be searched. On web pages and on 2D and 3D scenes often more objects, more information have to be discovered. Spatial placement of objects has influential role on reaction times, how soon an object will be found. In our work more objects had to be found on home pages and on skill-improving game programs by normal users and users with mild intellectual disabilities. We investigated the time and the sequence of finding targets in function of their location on the screen and their properties (e.g. size). We worked out a method for analysing navigation routes and discovering differences between the target groups, which can be used in further investigations as well.

Navigation Strategies in Case of Different Kind of User Interfaces

Information seeking is a very frequent task in our everyday computer usage. We often search not only one but also more information, more objects on web pages, on the user interface of different kind of software or multimedia program. In our study we sought the answer to the question how property of objects (etc. size, form) influence the time needed to find them, how object placement influence searching time, what kind of searching strategy users use to find the targets and whether we find everything we need. We examined within-page navigation thus, all targets were placed on the same screen. Users had to search among 2and 3-dimensional shapes and in pictures.

User interface design for visually impaired children

The paper first summarizes questions related to partial sightedness, followed by the description of programs written in Macromedia Director 8.5. Three game programs are described that can be used to develop the sight of visually impaired children.The main part of the paper describes a program, which was developed in the framework of ICT, where teachers can upload their materials to the server in a suitable form for normal vision and students can use them according to their special needs. Thus, each student can change the size of the letters, the colour of the letters and of the background, etc. This is a good help for visually impaired children to increase their communication and learning possibilities.ZusammenfassungDie Arbeit fasst zuerst Fragen der Sehbehinderungen zusammen, dann werden Programme beschrieben, die mit Macromedia Director 8.5 erstellt wurden. Zuerst behandein die Autoren drei Programme, die von sehbehinderten Kindern als Spiele aufgefasst werden, aber ihre Sehleistung fördern.Der Hauptteil der Arbeit befasst sich mit einem Programm, das gemäß der Erwartungen von ICT aufgebaut wurde, bei dem der Lehrer sein Unterrichtsmaterial als Normalsichtiger auf den Server aufspielen kann und die Kinder es ihrer Sehbehinderungen entsprechend lesen können. So können sie die Größe der Buchstaben, die Farbe der Buchstaben und des Hintergrundes usw. individuell einstellen. Das ist eine gute Hilfe für sehbehinderte Kinder, um ihre Kommunikations- und Lernmöglichkeiten zu fördern.

Analysing the navigation of mentally impaired children in virtual environments

In today’s information society, computer users frequently need to seek for information on home pages as well as to select among software functions. A well-designed interface is essential in order to find everything necessary and meet the requirements of both the average user and users with special needs. Our project set out to discover where and with how much contrast objects should be placed on the screen in order to find everything easily. We examine what kind of characteristic searching routes can be found and whether we can find differences between the average user and mentally retarded user in navigation and everyday searching exercises.

The Design Question of Development of Multimedia Educational Software for Aphasia Patients

Aphasia is an impairment of language, affecting the production or comprehension of speech and the ability to read or write. Most common cause of aphasia is – about 23–40 % of stroke survivors – acquired aphasia. The rehabilitation of aphasia is a medical, special treatment (speech therapy), which is the task of a psychologist. It needs long and intensive therapy. More detailed information about therapy can be found in [2,6]. In this paper we present our implementation or realization of interactive multimedia educational software to develop readiness of speech for helping the therapy within the frame of youth scientific and MSc thesis works. The first program was developed in Flash, the second in Macromedia Director. The goal of our software is to teach the most important everyday words. The software will be a useful device in the education of children with heavy mental deficiencies. Reading the program you can learn how it works and what current results we have achieved.

Developing interactive multimedia rehabilitation software for treating patients with aphasia

Aphasia is an impairment of language, affecting the production or comprehension of speech and the ability to read or write. Most common cause of aphasia is acquired aphasia. The rehabilitation of aphasia is medical, speech therapy and psychological. It needs long and intensive therapy. In this paper we present our implementation or realization of interactive multimedia educational software to develop readiness of speech for helping the therapy. The software was developed within the frame of youth scientific and MSc thesis works. The first program was developed in Flash, the second in Macromedia Director. The goal of our software was to teach the most important everyday words. The software will also be a useful device in the education of children with mental deficiencies. Keywords·, aphasia, rehabilitation, multimedia, flash mx, director Correspondence: Cecilia Sik Lanyi, PhD, Associate professor, Pannon University, Department of Image Processing and Neurocomputing, H8200 Veszprdm, Egyetem str. 10., Hungary. E-mail: lanyi@almos.vein.hu Submitted:January 16, 2005. Revised: February 21, 2005. Accepted: March 01, 2005. INTRODUCTION Aphasia is an impairment of language, an acquired communication disorder that impairs a persons ability to process language but does not affect intelligence. Aphasia also impairs the ability to speak and to understand others, hence most people with aphasia experience difficulty in reading and writing. Although aphasia is most common among older people, it can occur in persons of all ages, races, nationalities, and gender. Further information about aphasia can be found in (1-3). Types of aphasia Global Aphasia is the most severe form. Patients with this type of aphasia can (a) produce only few recognizable words, (b) understand little or no spoken speech at all, and (c) neither read nor write. These symptoms can usually be seen after a patient has suffered a stroke and may rapidly improve if the damage has not been too extensive and if greater brain damage or more severe and lasting disability has not occurred. Brocas aphasia means that speech output is severely reduced, limited mainly to short utterances of less than four words. As a result, vocabulary access is limited and the formation of sounds is often laborious and clumsy. Patients with Brocas aphasia can understand speech and read, but the quality of speech is halting and effortful. Furthermore, such persons are very limited in writing. Mixed non-fluent aphasia means sparse and effortful speech resembling Brocas aphasia. Patients with this illness are limited in the comprehension of speech and do not read or write beyond elementary level. In the case of anomic aphasia, persons are left with a persistent inability to supply words for the things that they want to talk about. Such patients have problems mainly with nouns and verbs, but can understand speech well and, in most cases, can read adequately. Unfortunately these individuals have poor writing ability. What causes aphasia? The most common cause of aphasia is stroke, with ~23% to 40% of stroke survivors acquiring aphasia. The disorder can also result from head injury, brain tumor, or other neurologic causes. In the United States, estimates are that about one million people in have acquired aphasia, or 1 in every 250 persons. Aphasia in this condition is more common than in Parkinsons disease, cerebral palsy, or muscular dystrophy. About one-third of severely head-injured persons have aphasia, yet, most people have never heard of this communication disorder (3). Recovery from aphasia After stroke, if symptoms last longer than 2 or 3 months, complete recovery is unlikely. Nevertheless, we should note that some people continue to improve over a period of years and even decades. Improvement is a slow process that usually involves both helping the individual and the family to understand the nature of aphasia and learning the compensatory strategies for communicating. Communication with a person with aphasia First and foremost, as persons with aphasia must be considered normal human beings, talk to them as adults not as children. Minimizing or eliminating background noises helps a lot in understanding. Before starting communication, make sure you have the persons attention, and to make them feel confident, encourage them all the time. Use all