Watches for the Visually Impaired
In designing a time telling device for someone who cannot see, it’s important to consider the actual purposefulness of the device as well as well as it’s perception to others. We tell time by glancing at our wrist, either by looking down or by bringing the watch to eye level. This may give others varied impressions such as that we are possibly bored, being informative (someone asked us the time), impatient (if we check the watch a lot) or just want to know the time.
With the loss of sight, we must rely on our other senses to tell the time. This new ‘time telling’ interaction should be no more stigmatizing than the previous interaction. An audible watch may draw attention as would a watch that emits an odor depending on the hour. It’s also important that the watch be something elegant, versus a “handi-watch”. It should be appealing enough that others will desire it and not something that visually impaired people have no choice but to wear while others would never want to. With this goal in mind, designing with constraints can push watch design for everyone instead of just creating a customized, small-run, overpriced watch that stigmatizes the visually impaired.
If hearing and smell are out of the picture we will consider touch and taste. Tactility is the most appealing solution but has a cognitive disconnect we need to overcome to make the watch functional. Taste is just weird but may have interesting applications. We should not confine ourselves to the senses and consider solutions that employ sense combinations or potentially something else entirely.
