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Catherine Holloway, William Bhot, Keir X. X. Yong, Ian McCarthy, Tatsuto Suzuki, Amelia Carton, Biao Yang, Robin Serougne, Derrick Boampong, Nick Tyler, Sebastian J. Crutch, Nadia Berthouze and Youngjun Cho
Posterior Cortical Atrophy is a rare but significant form of dementia which affects people's visual ability before their memory. This is often misdiagnosed as an eyesight rather than brain sight problem. This paper aims to address the frequent, initial misdiagnosis of this disease as a vision problem through the use of an intelligent, cost-effective, wearable system, alongside diagnosis of the more typical Alzheimer's Disease.
Frontiers in Computer Science
Type
Themes
Research Group
Disability inclusion necessitates proactive efforts to ensure everybody has an independent and equitable opportunity to meaningfully participate in the activities of their choosing [1,2,3]. Furthermore, disability justice is not a minority concern. There are more than a billion disabled people worldwide, and impairment is something which affects most people’s family right now and will impact all of us over our lifetime. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) enshrines human rights of all disabled people [4], and in 2015 the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) recognised disability inclusion for the first time with the call to ‘leave no-one behind’. Increasingly, governments, non-governmental agencies and businesses alike are seeking to develop and implement policy and practice which enables greater social inclusion for disabled people (In this paper, Disabled People is used in line with the Social Model of Disability in the UK, though please note the UN uses ‘Persons with Disabilities’ as is common in North America) [5]. Eighty percent of the disabled people in the world live in low resource settings in the Global South [3] with a projected growth of this number due to an increase in population age, there is the ever-pressing need to critically evaluate how best to approach disability inclusion to build a societies where we all can flourish. Despite this, we lack case studies of how disability inclusion can be done well—in the literature and in practice. For this reason, we set out to undertake this research using one the most recognised cases of ‘disability inclusion done well’.
Sustainability
Type
Themes
Anna Vlachaki
The literature shows that research into the aesthetic aspects of prostheses is limited. Although there are suggestions that prostheses with high levels of emotionally-driven design may improve users’ well-being, they are based only on theoretical findings. Therefore, in this thesis the effects of emotionally-driven prostheses on users’ lives and society’s attitudes were explored, with respect to culture and more specifically, the theories of individualism/ collectivism. In order to investigate the effects of culture, the research was conducted in two countries with different cultures; the UK (individualistic) and Greece (collectivistic). The thesis began with a literature review across three core areas: user, product and environment, and revealed the importance of investigating an additional area; that of prosthetists. The research employed a qualitative approach and consisted of four studies.
Loughborough University
Type
Themes
Research Group
Sarah Kelly
A Doctoral Thesis. Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy of Loughborough University.
Loughborough University
Type
Themes
Research Group
Rhys James Williams
Thesis: Firstly, the research provides a methodological contribution showing how to conduct mixed-methods research to obtain rich insights into complex prosthesis phenomena. Secondly, the research highlights the need to appreciate psychological and contextual factors when researching prosthesis wearer thermal comfort. The research contributions are also converted into an implication for prosthesis design. The concept of 'regaining control' to psychologically mitigate thermal discomfort could be incorporated into technologies by using 'on-demand' thermal discomfort relief, rather than 'always-on' solutions, as have been created in the past.
UCL, ProQuest Dissertations Publishing
Type
Themes
Research Group
Sophia Esther Liiba Tetteh
A Doctoral Thesis. Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy of Loughborough University
Loughborough University
Type
Themes
Dr Chinemelu Ejiamatu Muoma Ezeh
Doctoral Thesis. Independent mobility is fundamental to the quality of life of people with impairment. Most people with severe mobility impairments, whether congenital, e.g., from cerebral palsy, or acquired, e.g., from spinal cord injury, are prescribed a wheelchair. A small yet significant number of people are unable to use a typical powered wheelchair controlled with a joystick. Instead, some of these people require alternative interfaces such as a head- array or Sip/Puff switch to drive their powered wheelchairs. However, these alternative interfaces do not work for everyone and often cause frustration, fatigue and collisions. This thesis develops a novel technique to help improve the usability of some of these alternative interfaces, in particular, the head-array and Sip/Puff switch.
UCL (University College London)
Type
Themes
Research Group
Charlotte Pyatt
A Doctoral Thesis. Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Loughborough University.
Loughborough University
Type
Themes
Research Group
Giulia Barbareschi
Doctoral Thesis. This thesis makes two contributions to facilitate wheelchair users’ engagement in the participatory design process for ATs, while being mindful of the burden of participation. The first contribution is a framework that provides a modular structure guiding the participatory design process from initial problem identification and analysis to facilitating collaborations between wheelchair users and designers. The framework identifies four factors determining the need and adoption process for ATs: (i) People focuses on the target population, (ii) Person includes personal characteristics, (iii) Activity refers to the challenges associated with the task, and (iv) Context encompasses the effect of the environment in which the activity takes place. The second contribution constitutes a rich picture of personal and external elements influencing real world wheelchair transfers that emerged from four studies carried out to investigate the effect of the framework factors on the design process for ATs.
UCL (University College London)
Type
Themes
Research Group
Troy Bodkin
Doctoral Thesis. This work is one of four multidisciplinary research studies conducted by members of this research cluster, focusing on the area of Computer Aided Design (CAD) for improving the interface with Additive Manufacture (AM) to solve some of the challenges presented with improving prosthetic socket design, with an aim to improve and streamline the process to enable the involvement of clinicians and patients in the design process.
Loughborough University
Type
Themes
Research Group
Jessica Noske-Turner, Emma Pullen, Mufunanji Magalasi, Damian Haslett, Jo Tacchi
Communication & Sport
Type
Themes
Public spaces, including recreational and social spaces, are often not prioritised. Inclusive public spaces are fundamental to participation and inclusive in society. Including persons with disabilities in the design and planning of the built environment supports equal rights and helps identify people’s aspirations for inclusive environments. Four city case studies will be discussed in this paper: Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia; Varanasi, India; Surakarta, Indonesia; and Nairobi, Kenya.
The Journal of Public Space