The field of assistive technology has made initial strides towards improving community travel for people with cognitive impairments, with several large research centers devoted to developing on-route assistance (systems and devices) for this user community. This focus, however, ignores critical and fundamental skills necessary for this population to utilize such devices. Difficulties with memory, new learning and executive functions (i.e., initiation, planning) prevent potential device users from getting out the door and even turning on a device or tool. The PI's data suggests that most trips are doomed not because of on-route travel problems, but rather due to lack of trip preparation and failure to successfully start a trip by getting out the door and to the first bus or taxi stop. In this project, the PI will take on this problem of "the first hundred yards" under the hypothesis is that it is possible to (a) design effective trip preparation systems that can support the cognitively impaired population in terms of community access, and (b) avoid the common problem of device abandonment for this population. The research approach is based on the following assumptions: that a successful design process for a travel system must be linked to a personal requirements engineering process that captures the goals and skills of individuals; that the design process must be composite, taking into account both computer-based components and people; and that the problem must be solved in context, which implies drawing in both members of a safety-net and community service-providers already in place at many destinations to assist a traveler. The project builds on the PI's fifteen years of experience with the brain injury population, as well as five years of experience delivering computer-based assistive technology. It has at its foundation a comprehensive study of the desires and needs of the population in terms of community access. A two-phase evaluation approach, which has proven highly successful in prior work on assistive technology and the brain-injury population, will be used to assess the outcomes of this research.
Broader Impacts: More than a million adults in the United States are diagnosed annually with cognitive impairments due to neurological disease or trauma, and it is estimated that there are currently up to 16 million Americans living with chronic brain disorders. Incidence rates for severe traumatic brain injury are higher than those for spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy, and muscular dystrophy combined. Unfortunately, cognitive disability from trauma and other conditions represents a "silent epidemic" in that research and technological resources are disproportionately distributed to help those who are blind, deaf or physically disabled, conditions which are easily observable. This project will attempt to redress this imbalance by affording individuals living with cognitive impairment due to acquired brain injury the ability to access public community resources using various modes of transportation, including walking, special-needs vans, and fixed-route public transport.
