| Summary: | 碩士 === 朝陽科技大學 === 工業工程與管理系碩士班 === 92 === Tactile maps, one of the navigation aids, are quite helpful to visually impaired people in terms of orientation and mobility. There are many foreign literatures on tactile maps recently, however, few studies and applications were found in Taiwan. The purpose of this study was to explore the ability of orientation and mobility for the visually impaired with the aid of tactile maps and to study the feasibility of tactile symbols involved in tactile maps.
The experimental tactile maps were designed and made in the laboratory and the senior and junior high school students at National Taichung School for the Visually Impaired were tested in two phases. In the static-phase experiment fifty-eight students were involved and conducted at National Taichung School. Four kinds of tactile maps were supplied in the experiment with the combinations of Braille, areal symbols, single-line and dual-line routes. The sixth floor of the Science and Engineering Building at Chaoyang University of Technology was selected to be the test facility of dynamic-phase experiment. Fourteen students were required to walk in the floor with the designed tactile map, which the subjects were allowed to carry during the tests.
It can be shown that some symbols may confuse each other in static-phase experiment and the effects of factors on the experiment through statistic analysis were investigated. In the dynamic-phase experiment, the subjects can reach all seven assigned positions without any help except the tactile map. The study may provide some insights into the design of public facilities regarding tactile maps in Taiwan.
|
|---|
