Methodology for Designing Systems Based on Tangible User Interfaces and Gamification Techniques for Blind People

Abstract

Having a disability does not mean being away from major technologies present today; even people with visual impairment or blindness use different options to access technological information. Recent studies have shown that using tangible user interfaces and gamification techniques brings considerable benefits to learning and the understanding of essential topics for these people. Therefore, METUIGA methodology has been developed to facilitate digital content creation that mixes both characteristics and seeks to take advantage of the primary means of knowledge that these people have as their sense of touch, enriched with techniques that encourage them to use applications more frequently. For this reason, novelties are shown within the requirements and the design stages to implement these techniques. This work shows prototypes that have been made following METUIGA methodology to help teach geometry and mathematical lessons for blind people. In addition, a third prototype focused on children with an autism spectrum disorder demonstrates how METUIGA methodology can be applied in a variety of subjects and for a number of disabilities. Finally, an analysis of the software methodology evaluation is presented to show the initial perceptions of software developers toward METUIGA methodology, where important results were obtained in relation to the software engineering process application.

Keywords

• software development
• tangible user interfaces
• gamification
• blind children
• computational applications