An augmentative and alternative communication tool for children and adolescents with cerebral palsy

Cleiton Eduardo Saturno, Alejandro Rafael Garcia Ramirez, Mauro José Conte, Mísia Farhat and Elaine Carmelita Piucco

Behaviour and Information Technology, 2015, vol. 34, issue 6, 632-645

Abstract: People with disabilities face many accessibility problems in their daily lives. One such group of disabled people, children who suffer from cerebral palsy, faces specific challenges, which arise due to motor dysfunction and communication disorders. In the effort to help these children, augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) systems emerge as solutions to supplement spoken communication or to replace it completely. But current AAC solutions do not always address specific communication needs. Determining how to collaborate directly with cerebral palsy children as partners in the assistive technology design process is still an open research problem. This work discusses the development of an AAC computer-based solution to act as a complement to therapist's AAC activities in helping make the lives of children with disabilities better. The AAC tool is based on symbols located on a computer screen and uses symbol and phrase suggestion strategies aiming to increase communication efficiency. Two school-age students with cerebral palsy participated in this study. Quantitative reports and qualitative assessments from a speech and an occupational therapist are presented. This research deals with a set of accessibility guidelines that benefit researchers and practitioners, giving more evidence about the design of AAC computer-based solutions for people with limited speech or language skills.

Date: 2015
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/0144929X.2015.1019567 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:tbitxx:v:34:y:2015:i:6:p:632-645

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/tbit20

DOI: 10.1080/0144929X.2015.1019567

Access Statistics for this article

Behaviour and Information Technology is currently edited by Dr Panos P Markopoulos

More articles in Behaviour and Information Technology from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().