A device-interaction model for users with special needs
This addresses accessibility challenges for students with disabilities in education, though it appears incremental as it builds on existing adaptation and user modeling approaches.
The paper tackles the problem of computer interaction for people with special needs by proposing a new device-interaction model based on adaptation rules for user models, with promising results from an evaluation involving students with physical, sensory, or autism disabilities in an education setting.
Interaction is a fundamental part of using any computer system but it is still an issue for people with special needs. In order to improve this situation, this paper describes a new device-interaction model based on adaptation rules for user models. The aim is the adaptation at the interaction level, taking into account the interaction device features in order to improve the usability through the user experience in the education sector. In the evaluation process, several students from a special education center have participated. These students have either a physical or sensory disability or autism. The results are promising enough to consider that this model will be able to help students with disabilities to interact with a computer system which will inevitably provide tremendous benefits to their academic and personal development.