Week 3 Assignment Sharon

What are the main challenges in applying mainstream mobile technologies to meet the needs of people who have autism or other cognitive disabilities?

1. For people with cognitive disabilities, learning new functions on mobile devices can be difficult. The mobile technologies may not be that accessible to them.
2. The problems of people with cognitive disabilities are very diverse and there are many special cases. Therefore, the design of products is often customized according to different special needs, which may lead to a lack of capital. Few companies are willing to spend a lot of capital to produce products with low profits.
3. Today’s technology is not fully developed, and some requirements cannot be met due to technical constraints.

List three benefits of making mainstream mobile technologies accessible for people with autism or other cognitive disabilities.

1. Mobile technologies can offer different ways that canā€™t be achieved by the traditional methods to help people with cognitive disabilities learn about the world comprehensively. According to Chapter 15, notebook computers, mobile phones, and tablets have been programmed to function as both augmentative communication devices (see Chapter 16) and as cognitive assists (Stock et al, 2008). They have an output of either speech or visual characters and text. These input/ output features may be operated in many different ways.
2. Mobile technologies can help strengthen memory. As is talked in the text, reminding people to take their medication is one of the main uses of memory assistance technologies.
3. Mobile technologies can help people with cognitive disabilities have a sense of time. In the text, we know there is one class of devices that uses an alternative format for representing time to make it more accessible to individuals with intellectual disabilities.

How can technologies help to overcome stigma and discrimination for people with autism or other cognitive disabilities?

1. Cognitive disabilities are often regarded as a part of the social identity of people who have them. When the person with such social identity utilizes assistive technologies, especially those based on mainstream technologies, ā€œthere is a perception of competence and skill resulting from device use that can positively impact social interaction and self-imageā€ (404).
2. When using online devices, people with cognitive disabilities can have the opportunity to choose whether or not to disclose their disability. So they can communicate with others without disclosing the disability.
3. Technologies designed for people with cognitive disabilities can let them regain the ability to access the Internet. Because of their disabilities, they often cannot access the Internet as others, but mobile devices designed for them can allow them to regain access to the Internet, as long as designers pay attention to some aspects of the deviceā€™s design.

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