VOCAs: Assistive Technology for People with Speech Impairments

“More important than the right to speech is the right to speak.” The world renowned British theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking knows this exactly to be true.

Having been robbed of his ability to speak to a motor neuron disease, Stephen Hawking had to struggle with crude communication systems just to be able to tell his wants and needs…until he discovered VOCAs.

If it had not been for VOCAs, Stephen Hawking’s insights into the nature of space and time would not have been known.

This assistive technology has allowed him to communicate, write and publish his works, and give lectures to live audiences around the world in spite of losing his ability to speak.

In this post we will explore what VOCAs are and how these instruments give people an ability that most of us take for granted.

What are VOCAs?
VOCAs refer to voice output communication aids. These are electronic devices used by people who are either unable to speak or whose speech is difficult to understand.

VOCAs are used for augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). The term refers to different communication methods used by people who are unable to speak, have difficulty speaking, or have restrictions in understanding spoken or written communication.

Who uses VOCAs?
VOCAs are used by people who have limited or absent speech to communicate with the people around them. These include people who suffer from neurological disorders, such as autism, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, and epilepsy.

VOCAs are also used to help an individual regain his ability to speak that might have been lost due to stroke, brain damage, or a motor neuron disease. An example of a motor neuron disease is Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, which Stephen Hawking was diagnosed with.

Are there different types of VOCAs?
Just as there are different types of people who use VOCAs, there are also different types of VOCAs. These vary in all shapes, sizes, and complexity.

Dedicated Communication Devices vs. Communication Software Programs

VOCAs may be dedicated communication devices or laptop computers with specialized software installed.

Dedicated communication devices are designed primarily for communication, while computer based VOCAs are typically programmed to include additional features, such as an environmental control system.

An environmental control system allows the VOCA user to independently turn on electronic devices, such as the lights or television, via remote control.

Speech
Some VOCAs use digitized speech or a recorded natural speech of a person for voice output. Frequently used words, phrases, or sentences are recorded and stored into the device by somebody else other than the VOCA user. The VOCA user then pushes a button or turns a switch to play the message.

A VOCA with digitized speech can only say what someone has already recorded into it. However, they are easier to program than the VOCAs that use synthesized speech.

VOCAs that use synthesized speech make use of a speech synthesizer to produce artificial speech. These VOCAs use text to speech systems. This type of device is more flexible because users are not dependent on pre-recorded messages on their device. The speech synthesizer can say any combination of words, phrases, or sentences that the user chooses.

Representation of Messages
VOCAs may use text-based or symbol-based programs to represent messages on the device. Symbol-based VOCAs use pictures or symbols to represent messages which are supplied through symbol organizational systems. This type of device is typically used by individuals whose literacy level makes it difficult for them to use text-based VOCAs.

Text-based VOCAs typically have a keyboard for entering messages. They often feature a “word prediction” facility which helps reduce the number of keystrokes a user has to make. It also functions as a support tool for people whose spelling is not consistently reliable.

How are VOCAs accessed and controlled?

VOCAs can be adjusted according to its user’s needs.

Buttons
Some people that use VOCAs have fine motor skills and they are able to press buttons on the devices. Adjusting the sensitivity of buttons and keyguards can help VOCA users that may have limited motor skills. Keyguards are plates that sit above the buttons of a VOCA device or a keyboard. They help the user to press the right key with more precision.
Switches

People that have limited fine motor skills input messages to a VOCA device through visual scanning. This technique is used by Stephen Hawking. Professor Hawking uses a switch to move through the letters on an onscreen grid. He then presses the switch to select the letter that he wants.

Other Access Methods used in VOCAs
Other access methods include:

• a standard mouse;
• mouse that can be controlled by the head;
• joysticks; and
• rollerballs.

Conclusion
It is truly hard to imagine living a life of silence, where your thoughts and dreams stay locked within you. VOCAs have given people with communication problems the freedom to express themselves and live life fully.

Blind users gain Internet access via Smartphones

Jessica Rathwell holds her iPhone close to her ear while she types out a tweet using special voiceover technology. With remarkable speed, she navigates her way through her tiny keyboard, adding and deleting letters.

Rathwell is blind, and she is a self-described huge Apple fan and tech geek.

Her technology skills have led her to a career in teaching other blind and low-vision people to use Apple computers and devices as they come out of the box, with no additional technology or modifications.

She got her first Apple computer in the 1990s, but had to give up the operating system when they took a big step away from assistive technology.

That meant years of working on a Microsoft system. In 2008, Rathwell saw the Tiger 10.4 operating system for Apple computers that had voice-enabled software. It was the first time Rathwell could take a stock unit out of the box and use it as is.

"For me, it was the joy of inclusion," she says. "When you spend your life in school having to always have some sort of assistive technology, it feels so good when you no longer have to."

By all accounts, Rathwell is a whiz on all things Apple, and teaches other people at the Nanaimo and Region Disability Resource Centre to use a computer and gain full access to the Internet.

Rathwell's Microsoft counterpart is Aedan Staddon. The two have a friendly rivalry, and Rathwell has started learning on Mac computers as well.

"Learning from a blind person is better because they teach you what you realistically can and can't do," he says.

He is currently taking online courses in computer programming through the Cisco Academy for the Visually Impaired.

A room full of people who have sight issues discuss their pre-ferred operating system, and talk about Twitter and Facebook. Before Rathwell and Staddon started teaching, their students' experience with the technology could be kind of scary and frustrating. That's changed now, and their students at NRDRC, a volunteer charity, are happy.

"The Internet is a conversation point," says Rathwell. "And it's nice to be able to use it the same way anybody does."

Dyslexia: Recognising accents and voices can be difficult

People with dyslexia may not notice how people pronounce words differently, something that makes voice recognition possible, U.S. researchers say.

Tyler Perrachione, a doctoral candidate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says even though all people who speak a language use the same words, they say those words just a little bit differently from one another -- what is called phonetics in linguistics.

Listeners are sensitive to phonetic differences as part of what makes a person's voice unique, but individuals with dyslexia have trouble recognizing phonetic differences, whether a person is speaking a familiar language or a foreign one, Perrachione says.

The MIT scientists trained people with and without dyslexia to recognize the voices of people speaking either the listeners' native language of English or an unfamiliar foreign language, Mandarin Chinese.

The neuroscientists found people with dyslexia were significantly worse at being able to consistently recognize the voices of the English speakers, but they were about the same as listeners without dyslexia at recognizing the Chinese voices. Both groups were very poor at recognizing voices speaking an unfamiliar language, Perrachione says.

The finding, published in Science, reaffirms the theory that the underlying deficit in dyslexia isn't about the act of reading per se, but instead involves difficulty with how sounds of spoken language are heard and processed in the dyslexic brain.

Dyslexia - Software, voice recognition, Dragon NaturallySpeaking 10 – Nuance

Software, voice recognition, Dragon NaturallySpeaking 10 – Nuance