Computer–Oriented Technology for Blind Readers

Abstract

Twenty-nine visually handicapped subjects participated in a research project in which a daily newspaper was transmitted into their homes and read to them with the help of speech synthesis. With the use of computer and telecommunication techniques, almost the entire newspaper was transmitted; this is an important change in providing news to blind people. Questions of interest in this study included the subjects’ reactions to the reading device and their use of the different reading facilities offered. Reactions were, in general, very favorable. The project demonstrated the importance to the subjects of receiving a newspaper at the same time sighted people received theirs and the chance to choose what to read easily. The intelligibility of the synthetic speech was considered high. Although the subjects read a lot, they mainly used few of the available commands. In areas in which it was possible to compare their reading habits with those of sighted persons, striking similarities were found.