1. Sensory Disabilities
AT Bootcamp
ATIA 2013
Behnke, Marotta & Wojcik

2. Statistics
 6.8 million people in the US have a
visual disability
 10.5 million people in the US have a
hearing impairment
 Reference: 2011 reports from
http://www.disabilitystatistics.org/

3. Sensory Impairments
 Sensory impairments refer to the reduced
ability or lack of ability in using one or
more of three senses: vision, touch and
hearing.
 This includes tactile defensiveness or
numbness of touch, visually impaired
which includes blind, legally blind, deaf-
blind, hard of hearing and deaf.

4. Assistive technology for persons
with low vision
 Screen magnifiers have these features:
◦ Zoomtext demo
◦ Reverse polarity (Negative Contrast)
◦ Magnification
◦ Zooming feature
◦ Color enhancements
◦ Speech output (vary)
◦ Keyboard enhancements (e.g. keycaps)

5. Assistive technology tools for persons
who are blind
 Screen reading software
◦ Examples are JAWS, Window-Eyes, VoiceOver
 Video Magnifiers (aka CCTV)

6. Tactile Graphics
 BANA (Braille Authority of North America)
 Guidelines & Standards for Tactile
Graphics

7. Braille technology
 Refreshable braille displays
 Braille Embossers
 Braille writers and notetakers

8. Other examples…
 Talking GPS
 Audio description

9. Assistive technology for people with
hearing impairments
 Hearing aids
 Assistive listening devices
 Captioning
 Speech to text
 Cochlear Implants
 Visual alert signalers
 Telecommunications:
◦ Texting
◦ Bluetooth
◦ Point to Point Video (e.g., Skype)