• International Journal of Railway
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.143-148
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• 2008

This paper is the output of a collaborative European project concerning the barrier free accessibility for disabled persons to regional and long distance trains in Europe. Disabled people represent around 13% of the population in Europe. This is approximately 63 million people. The range of disabilities includes people with reduced mobility including wheel chair users, viewing and hearing impaired people and other forms of impairment. Improving accessibility aims at contributing to the provision of public transport services to all citizens in an equitable way. The purpose of the project was to analyse and to evaluate the existing solutions at selected European railways for all required modules at the entrance (doors, information and safety solutions), to derive a design concept, to develop a mock-up in meeting the needs of rail travellers with the above mentioned impairments and to test it with user groups. The project also aims at deriving components for the determination of standards. The EUPAX Design Mock-up test was performed to verify the advantages of the layout of the train segment including the different modules such as access area (including the access door, gaps between platform and train as well as boarding aid devices), entrance vestibule, information systems inside and outside the train, emergency facilities, toilet with all conveniences and the additional test arrangements regarding push buttons, steps and emergency equipment. For this purpose a questionnaire was developed for the assessment of the EUPAX segment and the additional test arrangements. With the help of this questionnaire it was possible to execute a quantitative and qualitative evaluation. During three test phases 67 experts and handicapped persons from 6 countries have evaluated the Industrial Design mock-up based on this questionnaire. The test group covered persons from North (Denmark) to the South (Italy) and from the West (Spain) to the Middle of Europe (Germany). This is especially important for the generalization (harmonisation) of the results for all European countries. According to COST 335 the information for people with reduced mobility should be clear, concise, accurate and timely. So that all information can be received from persons, they must be transferred on at least two of the three possible ways (acoustical, visual, tactile), a so called "2-sense-principle". Based on the results ergonomic specifications/ solutions for the ergonomic design of the access area, the acoustic, visual and tactile information and the emergency devices including the emergency communication system were developed, related to the benefiting passenger groups.

• International Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.87-102
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• 2013

This study investigated residents' preferences for spatial features of sitting areas in assisted living facilities, and provides recommendations for planning sitting areas to support residents' spatial preferences and social interaction. The study participants were 69 residents of eight assisted living facilities (30+ resident capacity), located in south central Texas. A photographic comparison method was used, in which residents were shown 20 matched pairs of photos, with a single feature digitally modified in each pair, and asked to select which environmental representation they preferred. The hypothesized spatial characteristics were identified in practice based literature as those that may encourage usage of sitting areas: viewability, variety, homelikeness, and privacy. Most of the hypothesized features were preferred by participants, with the highest preference found for non-institutional furniture arrangements and naturalness, followed by increasing enclosure and variety of seating. Preference was less significant for domestic cues such as carpeted floors, divided light windows, and boundaries defined by different colored material or columns, possibly due to their physical impairments or preference for visual openness. Participants' level of mobility assistance was significantly related to their preference for some features, such as seating with people-watching capability, and carpeted floors. The findings have implications for facility architects and administrators engaged in resident-oriented spatial planning.

• The Journal of the Institute of Internet, Broadcasting and Communication
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.201-208
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• 2023

Visually impaired people have difficulty accessing medical services and drug information, and it is not easy for them to take the correct drugs. A health law has been established to deal with this, but the plans are not unified and not applicable to all over-the-counter medicines. Therefore, we planned an application that provides instructions for taking general medicines using image recognition technology, bar code, and QR recognition technology for visually impaired people who are in the blind spot of taking general medicines. In this research, we will optimize the camera shooting environment standards and UI and UX screens for image recognition for the visually impaired, and improve the accessibility for the visually impaired to make it more convenient. If you can apply the results of your research to an application and provide it, it will help people with visual impairments learn the correct way to take over-the-counter medicines.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.363-369
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• 2021

This study improves the design of electric pot and cup that can safely pour and drink hot beverages among daily necessities for the blind and the elderly. It looks at the electric pot and cup that people with visual impairments usually use through their use perspective and studies and improves the safety problems that arise when using them based on the principle of universal design. Through this prior study, we study designs that can be used and shared by all disabled and socially disadvantaged people together and improve the design of household goods to expand the scope of use of general products and create new social values. In addition, through this design improvement process, everyone pursues an equal and virtuous life together, forms a well-off inclusive society, and takes advantage of the current position of the disabled and value of life once again.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.313-323
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• 2017

This study is a descriptive study that investigates the factors that affect the frailty of the elderly in the late period. The data were collected using a questionnaire during the period from 1 to 31 of December 2013. The subjects were 301 elderly people aged 70 years living in M city. The data were analyzed using a $x^2$ test, t-test, and ANOVA with the SPSS Statistics 18.0 program. Hierarchical regression analysis was performed to examine the factors that affect the weakness of elderly people. The results showed that 15.3% of the elderly living at home were frail. The factors that affect the frailty of the elderly were sex (p<0.01), nutritional status (p<0.01), cognition function (p<0.01), ADL (p<0.01), IADL (p<0.05), visual acuity (p<0.05), and chewing discomfort (p<0.05). A higher the degree of frailty was associated with women, poorer nutritional status, higher impairments to perform the daily activities (ADL and IADL), poorer hearing, and more feeling of chewing discomfort. These results can explain the frailty of elderly people over 70 years of age in a local community and the variables of health. The results suggest that the development of a comprehensive program for the elderly with weak physical, emotional, and functional health should be given priority.

• 재활복지
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.129-146
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• 2017

In an event of an emergency, such as fire in a building, visually impaired and blind people are prone to exposed to a level of danger that is greater than that of normal people, for they cannot be aware of it quickly. Current fire detection methods such as smoke detector is very slow and unreliable because it usually uses chemical sensor based technology to detect fire particles. But by using vision sensor instead, fire can be proven to be detected much faster as we show in our experiments. Previous studies have applied various image processing and machine learning techniques to detect fire, but they usually don't work very well because these techniques require hand-crafted features that do not generalize well to various scenarios. But with the help of recent advancement in the field of deep learning, this research can be conducted to help solve this problem by using deep learning-based object detector that can detect fire using images from security camera. Deep learning based approach can learn features automatically so they can usually generalize well to various scenes. In order to ensure maximum capacity, we applied the latest technologies in the field of computer vision such as YOLO detector in order to solve this task. Considering the trade-off between recall vs. complexity, we introduced two convolutional neural networks with slightly different model's complexity to detect fire at different recall rate. Both models can detect fire at 99% average precision, but one model has 76% recall at 30 FPS while another has 61% recall at 50 FPS. We also compare our model memory consumption with each other and show our models robustness by testing on various real-world scenarios.

• Journal of the HCI Society of Korea
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.29-36
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• 2006

Tactile displays can provide useful information without disturbing others and are particularly useful for people with visual or auditory impairments. They can also complement other displays. In this paper, we present a new vibrotactile display device for wearable, mobile, and ubiquitous computing environments. The proposed vibrotactile device has a $5{\times}5$ array configuration for displaying complex information such as letters, numbers, and haptic patterns as well as simple directional ques and situation awareness alarms. Commercially available coin-type vibration motors are embedded vertically in flexible mounting pads in order to best localize vibrations on the skin. An embedded microprocessor controls the motors sequentially with an advanced tracing mode to increase recognition rate. User studies with the vibrotactile device on the top of the foot show 86.7% recognition rate for alphabet characters after some training. In addition, applying vibrotactile device to driving situation shows 83.9% recognition rate. We also propose some potentially useful application scenarios including Caller Identification for mobile phones and Navigation Aids for GPS systems while driving.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.5-13
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• 2014

Objectives: Depression, sleep complaints and cognitive impairments are commonly observed in the elderly. Elderly subjects with depressive symptoms have been found to show both poor cognitive performances and sleep disturbances. However, the relationship between sleep complaints and cognitive dysfunction in elderly depression is not clear. The aim of this study is to identify the association between sleep disturbances and cognitive decline in late-life depression. Methods: A total of 282 elderly people who underwent nocturnal polysomnography in a sleep laboratory were enrolled in the study. The Korean version of the Neuropsychological Assessment Battery developed by the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's Disease (CERAD-K) was applied to evaluate cognitive function. Depressive symptoms were assessed with the geriatric depression scale (GDS) and subjective sleep quality was measured using the Pittsburg sleep quality index (PSQI). Results: The control group ($GDS{\leq}9$) when compared with mild ($10{\leq}GDS{\leq}16$) and severe ($17{\leq}GDS$) depression groups, had significantly different scores in the Trail making test part B (TMT-B), Benton visual retention test part A (BVRT-A), and Stroop color and word test (SCWT)(all tests p<0.05). The PSQI score, REM sleep duration, apnea-hypopnea index and oxygen desaturation index were significantly different across the three groups (all indices, p<0.05). A stepwise multiple regression model showed that educational level, age and GDS score were predictive for both TMT-B time (adjusted $R^2$=35.6%, p<0.001) and BVRT-A score (adjusted $R^2$=28.3%, p<0.001). SCWT score was predicted by educational level, age, apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) and GDS score (adjusted $R^2$=20.6%, p<0.001). Poor sleep quality and sleep structure alterations observed in depression did not have any significant effects on cognitive deterioration. Conclusion: Older adults with depressive symptoms showed mild sleep alterations and poor cognitive performances. However, we found no association between sleep disturbances (except sleep apnea) and cognitive difficulties in elderly subjects with depressive symptoms. It is possible that the impact of sleep disruptions on cognitive abilities was hindered by the confounding effect of age, education and depressive symptoms.

• Journal of the Korean Society of School Health
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.118-135
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• 1988

This study is designed to analyze the problems of health education in schools and explore the ways of enhancing health education from a historical perspective. It also shed light on the managerial aspect of health education (including medical-check-up for students disease management. school feeding and the health education law and its organization) as well as its educational aspect (including curriculum, teaching & learning, and wishes of teachers). At the same time it attempted to present the ways of resolving the problems in health education as identified her. Its major findings are as follows; I. Colculsion and Summary 1. Despite the importance of health education, the area remains relatively undeveloped. Students spend a greater part of their time in schools. Hence the government should develop a keener awareness of the importance of health education and invest more in it to ensure a healthy, comfortable life for students. 2. At the moment the outcomes of medical-check-up for students, which constitutes the mainstay of health education, are used only as statistical data to report to the relevant authorities. Needless to say they should be used to help improve the wellbeing of students. Specifically, nurse-teachers and home-room teachers should share the outcomes of medical-check-up to help the students wit shortcomings in growth or development or other physical handicaps more clearly recognize their problems and correct them if possible. 3. In the area of disease management, 62.6, 30.3 and 23.0 percent of primary, middle, and highschool students, respectively, were found to suffer from dental ailments. By contrast 2.2, 7.8, and 11.5 percent of primary, middle and highschool students suffered from visual disorders. The incidence of dental ailments decreases while that of visual impairments increases as students grow up. This signifies that students are under tremendous physical strain in their efforts to be admitted by schools of higher grade. Accordingly the relevant authorities should revise the current admission system as well as improve lighting system in classrooms. 4. Budget restraints have often been cited as a major bottleneck to the expansion of school feeding. Nevertheless it should be extended at least, to all primary schools even at the expense of parents to ensure the sound growth of children by improving their diet. 5. The existing health education law should be revised in such a way as to better meet the needs of schools. Also the manpower for health education should be strengthened. 6. Proper curriculum is essential to the effective implementation of health education. Hence it is necessary to remove those parts in the current health education curriculum that overlaps with other subjects. It is also necessary to make health education a compulsory course in teachers' college at the same time the teachers in charge of health education should be given an in-service training. 7. Currently health education is being taught as part of physical education, science, home economics or other courses. However these subjects tend to be overshadowed by English, mathematics, and other subjects which carry heavier weight in admission test. It is necessary among other things, to develop an educational plan specifying the course hours and teaching materials. 8. Health education is carried out by nurse-teachers or home-room teachers. In connection with health education, they expressed the hope that health education will be normalized with newly-developed teaching material, expanded opportunity for in-service training and increased budget, facilities and supply of manpower. These are the mainpoints that the decision-makers should take into account in the formation of future policy for health education. II. Recommendations for the Improvement of Health Education 1. Regular medical check-up for students, which now is the mainstay of health education, should be used as educational data in an appropriate manner. For instance the records of medical check-up could be transferred between schools. 2. School feeding should be expanded at least in primary schools at the expense of the government or even parents. It will help improve the physical wellbeing of youths and the diet for the people. 3. At the moment the health education law is only nominal. Hence the law should be revised in such a way as to ensure the physical wellbeing of students and faculty. 4. Health education should be made a compulsory course in teachers' college. Also the teachers in service should be offered training in health education. 5. The curriculum of health education should be revised. Also the course hours should be extended or readjusted to better meet the needs of students. 6. In the meantime the course hours should be strictly observed, while educational materials should be revised in no time. 7. The government should expand its investment in facilities, budget and personnel for health education in schools at all levels.