Eye movements and stress during eye-tracking gaming performance in children with dyskinetic cerebral palsy

The psychosocial impact of eye-gaze assistive technology on everyday life of children and adults

PURPOSE

This study investigates the psychosocial impact of eye-gaze assistive technology (EGAT) in both children and adults with long-term experience using eye-gaze assistive technology in everyday life, as well as the psychosocial impact as related to duration of use.

METHODS

In this descriptive comparative study, 34 adult and 27 child EGAT users participated in a structured individual interview using the Psychosocial Impact of Assistive Devices Scale (PIADS).

RESULTS

The participants' age ranged from 5-74 years, 50% were female and 52% had been diagnosed with cerebral palsy. The EGAT had a positive psychosocial impact on competence, adaptability, and self-esteem among adult and child users. Competence was the only subscale with a higher value for adults (p = 0.038), compared to children. The items with the highest impact for the psychosocial aspects were quality of life, ability to participate, and self-esteem. The adults had longer duration of use than children, but for high-, medium-, and low-duration users, the device showed a positive psychosocial impact.

CONCLUSIONS

Participants considered EGAT to have high positive impacts for participation and quality of life. The study adds new knowledge in that high positive psychosocial impact may be found even among low-duration users of EGAT, which is important to consider for service providers.

Use of eye-gaze technology feedback by assistive technology professionals: findings from a thematic analysis

Purpose: Eye-gaze technology offers professionals a range of feedback tools, but it is not well understood how these are used to support decision-making or how professionals understand their purpose and function. This paper explores how professionals use a variety of feedback tools and provides commentary on their current use and ideas for future tool development.Methods and Materials: The study adopted a focus group methodology with two groups of professional participants: those involved in the assessment and provision of eye-gaze technology (n = 6) and those who interact with individuals using eye-gaze technology on an ongoing basis (n = 5). Template analysis was used to provide qualitative insight into the research questions.Results: Professionals highlighted several issues with existing tools and gave suggestions on how these could be made better. It is generally felt that existing tools highlight the existence of problems but offer little in the way of solutions or suggestions. Some differences of opinion related to professional perspective were highlighted. Questions about automating certain processes were raised by both groups.Conclusions: Discussion highlighted the need for different levels of feedback for users and professionals. Professionals agreed that current tools are useful to identify problems but do not offer insight into potential solutions. Some tools are being used to draw inferences about vision and cognition which are not supported by existing literature. New tools may be needed to better meet the needs of professionals and an increased understanding of how existing tools function may support such development.

A novel investigation of eye-gaze as an access method for children with dyskinetic cerebral palsy

This commentary is on the original article by Bekteshi et al. on pages 1402–1415 of this issue.