Examining facial recognition technology to augment the indoor navigation experience of individuals who are blind

Abstract

Independent navigation is an important aspect in the lives of individuals who are blind. While orientation and mobility training often equip these individuals with skills for independent living, recent advances in navigation technologies could be used to augment the subjective quality of their navigation experience. In addition to outdoor navigation, blind individuals need to effectively navigate indoor spaces in different social contexts and environments. Moreover, they may need to identify the presence of known and unknown individuals in their vicinity in order to support social interactions (i.e. cueing the user to greet known individuals by name). Combining wearable solutions with computer vision and facial recognition (FR) technologies has the potential to help in this regard. However, only limited research has examined these technologies to inform the future design of assistive aids such that they meet the real world needs of this population. Research in this proposal aims to use a human-centric approach to understand both the technical and social aspects of FR technology and its integration with navigation aids. An optimal design framework will be sought in order to improve computer-vision-based navigation solutions for the blind community.