Comparing Modalities in Autonomous Indoor Wayfinding for People with Cognitive Impairments

Abstract

A wayfinding system is presented with an aim to increase workplace and life independence for cognitive-impaired individuals such as people with traumatic brain injury, cerebral palsy, intellectual and developmental disabilities, and schizophrenia. PDA prompting with navigation media at the right time and place can assist cognitively-impaired persons. Two modalities, video and picture prompts, were compared by 20 subjects with cognitive impairments. The experimental results show the computer-human interface is friendly and the capabilities of wayfinding are reliable. Video prompts performed better by 25%~28% than picture prompts at the price of users feeling slightly more rushed.