Hi everyone! My name is Foad Hamidi and in this video I'm presenting our paper
entitled "Knowledge Comes Through Participation": Understanding Disability Through the Lens of
DIY Assistive Technology in Western Kenya
on behalf of my colleagues Patrick MBullo Owuor,
Michaela Hynie, and Melanie Baljko. First, our introduction and motivation!
Most assistive technologies in lower and middle-income countries are manufactured elsewhere,
are expensive, and difficult to maintain, characteristics that pose barriers to access
for people who would benefit from them.
Do-It Yourself Assistive Technologies or DIY-ATs
that are designed, customized, and repaired by non-technical users offer exciting opportunities
in these contexts. Examples include a grip that can be used to pick up a pen or a spoon and can
be 3D printed and customized, or a single switch that can be created by everyday electronics.
Despite their potential the majority of research on DIY-ATs is is conducted outside of lower
and middle income countries (LMICs). In this study, we pursued the following research questions: what
are current technical and socio-political factors impacting at access in kenya and what potential
role can DIY-ATs play in this context? What are stakeholder reflections on the infrastructures and
sociotechnical factors involved in using DIY-ATs in Kenya? We chose to conduct the study in
Kenya as a representative lower and middle income country because there has been recent legislation
recognizing the rights of people with disabilities and in Kenya, and also Kenya
is a leader in the design and development of interactive technologies in Eastern Africa.
To pursue our research questions we use TalkBox a DIY assistive technology research probe.
TalkBox is a system that allows non-verbal users to communicate with others through
touching a series of conductive buttons that then activate the playback of a customized audio file.
It uses a Raspberry Pi and touch sensor to detect and respond to touch.
TalkBox is also open source and its hardware costs less than a hundred dollars.
TalkBox is customizable and can be used in a variety of scenarios.
Also the audio files and the number of buttons can be increased or reduced based on need. For example,
in the photo on the slide a child in with cerebral palsy in a wheelchair is using TalkBox
to play back audio files responding to an exercise that she's completing.
And in another photo a non-verbal youth is using it for greetings and communication with others.
This project is the final component of a longitudinal study where we worked with
teachers and students with disabilities at three special education schools in urban and rural areas
in Western Kenya, over approximately 3 years. We conducted interdisciplinary workshops where we
trained teachers on how to use this system and to customize it. And we conducted field work and
observations in the schools where the youth and children were using this device, and we conducted
focus groups and interviews with stakeholders. For the current paper, I'm going to only focus on
the final stakeholder focus group meeting where participants were discussing their reflections
on the possibilities and challenges of using a system like TalkBox in the Kenyan context.
Our participants represented a wide range of stakeholders
including government and non-governmental representatives,
special education teachers, therapists, students from the local university, and representatives from
innovation hubs and technology communities that are active locally.
To derive our results from the focus group, we audio recorded,
transcribed, and thematically analyzed data, and derived the following three overarching themes.
Our first finding outlines the socio-political aspects of disability in Kenya. Despite existing
legislation people with disabilities face barriers and there's a gap between legislation and
implementation. Participants described the need for increased resources, including teachers
programs and technologies, to make legislation a reality. They identified a possibility for
ubiquitous and mobile technologies including DIY solutions to implement accessible applications
with different functions such as assessment that can be conducted remotely.
Our study actually took place before COVID and so some of these findings are even more
relevant today. Another finding, underlined the importance of assistive technologies supporting
inclusion. Participants described that assistive technologies can contribute to inclusive education
and increase social participation. They can act as bridging mechanisms to challenge and connect the
experiences of people with disabilities across social, educational, and therapeutic contexts.
Assistive technologies can provide opportunities for their users to practice agency,
and complete daily tasks beyond the medical contexts. Finally, they can facilitate early
and frequent experiences of empowerment and inclusion for children with disabilities and their peers
so that they can get used to these experiences and normalize their social inclusion.
Finally, participants described that it is necessary to create local capacity to create
homegrown assistive technologies and keep their software and hardware components up to date.
Designers also need to ensure that technology does not negatively impact
their users and also does not create negative environmental concerns such as increased garbage.
Overall, participants were enthusiastic about the possibilities of digital assistive technologies
including DIY assistive technologies but also pointed out that the technologies
exist in a web of interrelationships among policy, governments, societal attitudes, and technology
access, more generally. They also pointed out that deploying these type of technologies needs
securing stakeholder buy-in and building local, technical, and social capacity and infrastructure
to support community-based sustainability.
I'll conclude by summarizing our key findings on the possibilities of DIY-ATs in Kenya. First, future
efforts should address infrastructural needs for making technology-focused DIY practices
sustainable. Second, we found aspirations to participate in technological innovation
coupled with a sensitivity to avoid dependencies and marginalizations in our stakeholders. Finally,
we found an increased awareness of social nature of disability but a lack of resources and concrete
efforts to facilitate impactful change. These all point to the possibilities of using participatory
community-based approaches in the future to identify and turn into reality the potentials of
homegrown DIY assistive technologies in Kenya and other lower and middle income countries.
Thank you very much! I hope you enjoyed the presentation and feel free to contact us with questions.