Comparison of Letter Identification by Touch between Blind and Sighted People

Abstract

The main purpose of this project was to see if there is a difference in performance between blind and sighted subjects when reading raised letters by feel. A secondary purpose was to attempt to find the optimum height while keeping all other variables constant. Six blind and 22 blindfolded subjects were asked to identify raised plastic letters by feel. The following confusion letters were used: E,F,P,R,G,C,O,Q,D,B,U,V,J,I,T. The heights were 1.27, 1.91 and 2.54 cm. The time it took to identify the letter and whether or not the letter was misidentified were recorded. There was not enough evidence to conclude a difference between blind and blindfolded subjects. The sizes 1.91 and 2.54 cm were not significantly different. However, 1.27 cm was harder to identify. There were significant differences between letters. There was no correlation between identification time and accuracy.