Empowering Orientation and Mobility Instructors: Digital Tools for Enhancing Navigation Skills in People Who Are Blind

Spatial navigation could present challenges for People Who are Blind (PWB), impeding their ability to effectively determine locations, navigate, and interact with their environment. This study proposes an innovative orientation and mobility (OM) virtual environment. Our research encompasses the development of a map editor and an audio-haptic OM training environment for mobile devices, empowering OM instructors to create customizable maps for training PWB, thus enhancing learner autonomy and independence. We evaluated it through an extensive assessment involving 25 human-computer interaction (HCI) specialists, 24 OM instructors, and 10 PWB. The evaluation aimed to gauge the system’s effectiveness in improving the navigation and wayfinding skills of PWB. Findings suggest that our approach significantly aids PWB in creating mental maps, facilitating navigation and spatial awareness. Feedback from HCI experts, OM instructors, and participants who were blind was instrumental in identifying critical areas for further refinement, particularly in enhancing the intuitiveness of the user interface and the accuracy of audio-haptic feedback. By enabling OM instructors to tailor learning materials to the specific needs of their students, this tool has the potential to make a meaningful impact on the autonomy and mobility of PWB. Further research and development are warranted to refine the system and explore its full potential in real-world applications.