Boyle, S., McNaughton, D., Light, J., Babb, S., & Chapin, S. E. (2021). The effects of shared e-Book reading with dynamic text and speech output on the single-word reading skills of young children with developmental disabilities. Language, Speech & Hearing Services in Schools (Online), 52(1), 426–435. • FREE on PubMed Background Shared book reading provides a context for single word reading […]
Improving the Design of AAC Systems
For individuals with complex communication needs, the visual features of an AAC display play a key role in supporting successful use. At present, many AAC systems have limited visual appeal, and may be viewed as complex in ways that make the system less effective.
From a visual perspective, a well designed AAC display
• is appealing
• presents information clearly
• is easy to learn and use
Our research challenge is to use what we know about learning/development and human visual processing to design AAC systems that are fun, linguistically powerful, and intuitive. When we design AAC systems that incorporate key visual features, individuals want to use them to communicate in play/leisure, academic, and social activities. We are exploring questions of visual design through both basic (e.g., behavioral and neuro-imaging technologies) and applied research studies (e.g., use of prototype displays in interactions that are personally relevant to the individual). We also know that the complexity of programming demands has an impact on how often vocabulary is added to systems. In order for AAC to be responsive to immediate needs, we have extensively explored and applied “just in time” (JIT) programming. JIT softwares are key not only because they reduce the workload of adding vocabulary by not requiring everything to be compiled ahead of an interaction, but also because the resulting communication supports have been optimized for that particular individual and situation within any given moment.
Effect of video VSDS on the communicative turns of preschoolers with ASD (Chapin et al., 2021)
Chapin, S.E., McNaughton, D., Light, J., McCoy, A., Caron, J., Lee, D.L. (2021). The effects of AAC video visual scene display technology on the communicative turns of preschoolers with autism spectrum disorder. Assistive Technology, Advance online publication (Full text available) Over 40% of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) experience difficulty in using speech. Many children with […]