The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation is seeking commercial partners interested in developing a method to detect reading behaviors via eye tracking. The technique uses a gaze-aware reading aid that provides targeted visual and audio augmentations based on users’ gaze behaviors.
Low vision that cannot be corrected by eyeglasses or contact lenses affects over 7 million Americans, with significant impact on quality of life and ability to read. Current challenges in generic magnification approaches include a lack of responsiveness to reader struggle, overall reduction of the field of view, and inability to distinguish similar words and/or contextual cues to locate the next line of text causing fatigue and eye discomfort. Reader-responsive approaches that address the difficulties faced by low vision readers are needed.
One potential solution is the use of reading aids that provide targeted visual and audio responses based on users’ visual gaze behaviors to reduce eye fatigue. In a reading task, this method uses eye-tracking support to model low vision user gazes, highlights the line a reader intends to read and magnifies or reads aloud a word that causes a reader to hesitate. Augmentation is designed to capture when a user is following a line of text, as well as when a user switches to a different line.
UW-Madison researchers have developed a method to track and model low vision user gazes, recognize intent and generate multimodal augmentations to improve reader performance in visual tasks to provide better reader experience with less eye fatigue and discomfort. Reader-aware eye-tracking technology provides visual and audio augmentations based on reader intention with design alternatives that include text enlargement, highlighting and/or arrows to point out the beginning of a line as well as difficult word support to augment words where a reader may be struggling in real time. Unlike conventional screen magnification, the eye-tracking technology reduces the time a reader needs to switch between lines of text, enables more page-scrolling flexibility and reduces the total number of misread words.
- Computer or smartphone integration
- Head-mounted augmented reality (AR) assistive technology
- Image exploration
- Reader-selective augmentation
- Reader navigation tasks
- Augmented reality systems with eye tracking
- Inform design considerations for low vison reader aids
- Improves time to switch between lines of text
- Enables more page-scrolling flexibility
- Reduces total number of misread words
- Enhances concentration and reading comprehension of low vision readers