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Auditory substitution of vision: pattern recognition by the blind
Author(s) -
Arno P.,
Vanlierde A.,
Streel E.,
WanetDefalque M.C.,
SanabriaBohorquez S.,
Veraart C.
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
applied cognitive psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.719
H-Index - 100
eISSN - 1099-0720
pISSN - 0888-4080
DOI - 10.1002/acp.720
Subject(s) - psychology , coding (social sciences) , pointer (user interface) , cursor (databases) , sensory substitution , visual perception , communication , speech recognition , computer vision , computer science , cognitive psychology , perception , sensory system , neuroscience , statistics , mathematics
Pattern recognition in a computer environment was investigated in 6 early blind and 6 blindfolded sighted subjects using auditory substitution of vision. Subjects had to scan visual patterns displayed on a PC screen by moving the pen of a graphics tablet, which lead to corresponding displacements of the cursor on the screen. A small screen area centered on the pointer was then translated into sounds according to a visual‐auditory transcription code. Subjects were trained to learn this code during 12 one‐hour sessions. Performance of both groups significantly increased with practice. This indicates that mental representations of visual patterns can be acquired through the auditory channel, even in the absence of visual experience. Moreover, blind subjects performed significantly better than sighted subjects did. This could be interpreted as a result of partial compensation for their loss of vision. Pattern recognition in a computer environment is thus possible using a fairly natural vision‐to‐audition coding scheme. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.