Broadening Our View: Assistive Technology for Cerebral Visual Impairment

TL;DR

This paper highlights the significant research gap in assistive technologies for Cerebral Visual Impairment (CVI), emphasizing the need for focused HCI and assistive tech solutions to improve quality of life for this underserved group.

Contribution

It provides a scoping review identifying the lack of assistive technology research specifically targeting CVI and calls for increased focus on this underrepresented demographic.

Findings

Only 3 out of 14 papers focus on assistive tech for CVI

Majority of research addresses diagnosis and rehabilitation, not assistive tools

Highlights opportunity for HCI community to develop targeted solutions

Abstract

Over the past decade, considerable research has been directed towards assistive technologies to support people with vision impairments using machine learning, computer vision, image enhancement, and/or augmented/virtual reality. However, this has almost totally overlooked a growing demographic: people with Cerebral Visual Impairment (CVI). Unlike Ocular Vision Impairments (OVI), CVI arises from damage to the brain's visual processing centres. This paper introduces CVI and reveals a wide research gap in addressing the needs of this demographic. Through a scoping review, we identified 14 papers at the intersection of these technologies and CVI. Of these, only three papers described assistive technologies focused on people living with CVI, with the others focusing on diagnosis, understanding, simulation or rehabilitation. Our findings highlight the opportunity for the Human-Computer Interaction and Assistive Technologies research community to explore and address this underrepresented domain, thereby enhancing the quality of life for people with CVI.