Interaction Paradigms for Brain-Body Interfaces for Computer Users with Brain Injuries

In comparison to all types of injury, those to the brain are among the most likely to result in death or permanent disability. Some of these brain-injured people cannot communicate, recreate, or control their environment due to severe motor impairment. This group of individuals with severe head injury have received limited help from assistive technology. Brain-Computer Interfaces have opened up a spectrum of assistive technologies, which are particularly appropriate for people with traumatic brain injury, especially those who suffer from “locked-in” syndrome. The research challenge here is to develop novel interaction paradigms that suit brain-injured individuals, who could then use it for everyday communications. The developed interaction paradigms should require minimum training, reconfigurable and minimum effort to use. This thesis reports on the development of novel interaction paradigms for Brain-Body Interfaces to help brain-injured people to communicate better, recreate and control their environment using computers despite the severity of their brain injury. The investigation was carried out in three phases. Phase one was an exploratory study where a first novel interaction paradigm was developed and evaluated with able-bodied and disabled participants. Results obtained were fed into the next phase of the investigation. Phase two was carried out with able participants who acted as development group for the second novel interaction paradigm. This second novel interaction paradigm was evaluated with non-verbal participants with severe brain injury in phase three. An iterative design research methodology was chosen to develop the interaction paradigms. A non-invasive assistive technology device named Cyberlink™ was chosen as the Brain-Body Interface. This research improved previous work in this area by developing new interaction paradigms of personalised tiling and discrete acceleration in Brain- Body Interfaces. The research hypothesis of this study ‘that the performance of the Brain-Body Interface can be improved by the use of novel interaction paradigms’ was successfully demonstrated

Motivation Modelling and Computation for Personalised Learning of People with Dyslexia

The increasing development of e-learning systems in recent decades has benefited ubiquitous computing and education by providing freedom of choice to satisfy various needs and preferences about learning places and paces. Automatic recognition of learners’ states is necessary for personalised services or intervention to be provided in e-learning environments. In current literature, assessment of learners’ motivation for personalised learning based on the motivational states is lacking. An effective learning environment needs to address learners’ motivational needs, particularly, for those with dyslexia. Dyslexia or other learning difficulties can cause young people not to engage fully with the education system or to drop out due to complex reasons: in addition to the learning difficulties related to reading, writing or spelling, psychological difficulties are more likely to be ignored such as lower academic self-worth and lack of learning motivation caused by the unavoidable learning difficulties. Associated with both cognitive processes and emotional states, motivation is a multi-facet concept that consequences in the continued intention to use an e-learning system and thus a better chance of learning effectiveness and success. It consists of factors from intrinsic motivation driven by learners’ inner feeling of interest or challenges and those from extrinsic motivation associated with external reward or compliments. These factors represent learners’ various motivational needs; thus, understanding this requires a multidisciplinary approach. Combining different perspectives of knowledge on psychological theories and technology acceptance models with the empirical findings from a qualitative study with dyslexic students conducted in the present research project, motivation modelling for people with dyslexia using a hybrid approach is the main focus of this thesis. Specifically, in addition to the contribution to the qualitative conceptual motivation model and ontology-based computational model that formally expresses the motivational factors affecting users’ continued intention to use e-learning systems, this thesis also conceives a quantitative approach to motivation modelling. A multi-item motivation questionnaire is designed and employed in a quantitative study with dyslexic students, and structural equation modelling techniques are used to quantify the influences of the motivational factors on continued use intention and their interrelationships in the model. In addition to the traditional approach to motivation computation that relies on learners’ self-reported data, this thesis also employs dynamic sensor data and develops classification models using logistic regression for real-time assessment of motivational states. The rule-based reasoning mechanism for personalising motivational strategies and a framework of motivationally personalised e-learning systems are introduced to apply the research findings to e-learning systems in real-world scenarios. The motivation model, sensor-based computation and rule-based personalisation have been applied to a practical scenario with an essential part incorporated in the prototype of a gaze-based learning application that can output personalised motivational strategies during the learning process according to the real-time assessment of learners’ motivational states based on both the eye-tracking data in addition to users’ self-reported data. Evaluation results have indicated the advantage of the application implemented compared to the traditional one without incorporating the present research findings for monitoring learners’ motivation states with gaze data and generating personalised feedback. In summary, the present research project has: 1) developed a conceptual motivation model for students with dyslexia defining the motivational factors that influence their continued intention to use e-learning systems based on both a qualitative empirical study and prior research and theories; 2) developed an ontology-based motivation model in which user profiles, factors in the motivation model and personalisation options are structured as a hierarchy of classes; 3) designed a multi-item questionnaire, conducted a quantitative empirical study, used structural equation modelling to further explore and confirm the quantified impacts of motivational factors on continued use intention and the quantified relationships between the factors; 4) conducted an experiment to exploit sensors for motivation computation, and developed classification models for real-time assessment of the motivational states pertaining to each factor in the motivation model based on empirical sensor data including eye gaze data and EEG data; 5) proposed a sensor-based motivation assessment system architecture with emphasis on the use of ontologies for a computational representation of the sensor features used for motivation assessment in addition to the representation of the motivation model, and described the semantic rule-based personalisation of motivational strategies; 6) proposed a framework of motivationally personalised e-learning systems based on the present research, with the prototype of a gaze-based learning application designed, implemented and evaluated to guide future work

An empirical investigation to examine the usability issues of using adaptive, adaptable, and mixed-initiative approaches in in-teractive systems

The combination of graphical user interface (GUI) and usability evaluation presents an advantage to mastering every piece of software and ensuring perfect quality of work. The increasing demand for online learning is becoming more important, both individually and academically. This thesis introduces and describes an empirical study to investigate and compare how vocabulary can be learned by using different interactive approaches; specifically, a static learning website (with straightforward words and meanings), an adaptable learning website (allowing the user to choose a learning method), an adaptive learning website (a system-chosen way of learning), and a mixed-initiative (mixing approaches and techniques). The purpose of this study is to explore and determine the effects of these approaches in learning vocabu-lary achievement to enhance vocabulary learning for non-English speakers. The par-ticipants were Arabic speakers. The three levels of vocabulary learning activities were categorised as easy, medium, and hard. The independent variables (IVs) were controlled during the experiment to ensure consistency and were as follows: tasks, learning effects, and time. The dependent variables (DVs) were learning vocabulary achievements and scores. Two aims were explored in relation to the effects of these approaches to achievement. The first related to learning vocabularies for non-English speakers tackling the difficulties of the English language and the second related to studying system usability of learning English vocabulary in terms of usability measures (efficiency, frequency of error occurrence, effectiveness, and satisfaction). For this purpose, a vocabulary-learning language website was designed, implement-ed, and tested empirically. To fulfill these requirements, it was first necessary to measure two usability components (efficiency and effectiveness) with a within-subject design of n = 24 subjects recruited and, for users’ satisfaction, a between-subject design of n = 99 subjects recruited, while investigating satisfaction with a system usability scale (SUS) survey. The results and data analysis were described. Overall, the results shown were all satisfactory

Interaction paradigms for brain-body interfaces for computer users with brain injuries

In comparison to all types of injury, those to the brain are among the most likely to result in death or permanent disability. Some of these brain-injured people cannot communicate, recreate, or control their environment due to severe motor impairment. This group of individuals with severe head injury have received limited help from assistive technology. Brain-Computer Interfaces have opened up a spectrum of assistive technologies, which are particularly appropriate for people with traumatic brain injury, especially those who suffer from “locked-in” syndrome. The research challenge here is to develop novel interaction paradigms that suit brain-injured individuals, who could then use it for everyday communications. The developed interaction paradigms should require minimum training, reconfigurable and minimum effort to use. This thesis reports on the development of novel interaction paradigms for Brain-Body Interfaces to help brain-injured people to communicate better, recreate and control their environment using computers despite the severity of their brain injury. The investigation was carried out in three phases. Phase one was an exploratory study where a first novel interaction paradigm was developed and evaluated with able-bodied and disabled participants. Results obtained were fed into the next phase of the investigation. Phase two was carried out with able participants who acted as development group for the second novel interaction paradigm. This second novel interaction paradigm was evaluated with non-verbal participants with severe brain injury in phase three. An iterative design research methodology was chosen to develop the interaction paradigms. A non-invasive assistive technology device named Cyberlink™ was chosen as the Brain-Body Interface. This research improved previous work in this area by developing new interaction paradigms of personalised tiling and discrete acceleration in Brain- Body Interfaces. The research hypothesis of this study ‘that the performance of the Brain-Body Interface can be improved by the use of novel interaction paradigms’ was successfully demonstrated.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo