[nfbwatlk] Participate in a Study Involving a Video Game that Adapts Yoga for People who are Blind or Visually Impaired

[Cindy Bennett]

Kinect® Eyes-Free Yoga Study

Have you ever wanted to participate more fully in video games? Have
you ever been afraid to go to an exercise class because you cannot see
well enough to understand the exercises? At the University of
Washington, researchers are designing a video game to help people
learn to participate in exercises without needing to see the screen.

Video games that concentrate on exercising are called exergames, and
we have developed a yoga exergame for the Kinect®. We are looking for
participants who are at least 18 years old and who are blind or
visually impaired to play this yoga exergame to give us feedback on
the accessibility of the game. We also request that you are willing
and able to perform the yoga poses without risk to your overall
health. You do not have to be an expert at yoga. We are looking for
beginners in yoga for this study. We want to hear from you!

The study will take approximately one hour and will be held on the
University of Washington campus or at a location in Vancouver, WA. If
you are not in either of these locations, but if you are interested,
please contact us anyway, and we'll see what we can do. You will take
a survey before and after playing the exergame. During the exergame,
you will be oriented to all of the yoga equipment, and you will have
the opportunity to perform six yoga poses. This study is confidential.
All of your answers to the survey questions will be confidential, and
only the researchers will be able to see you while you play the
exergame. There will be a video and audio recording, but throughout
the study you can tell us if you want something deleted from our
records.

The risk involved in this study is that you may not be able to perform
one or more of the yoga poses. If this happens, you should not
continue the pose. Participation is entirely voluntary, and you may
choose to stop the study or to not participate in any part of the
study at any time. You will receive $20 for your participation.

If you are interested in giving your valuable feedback to improve the
access of exergames for blind and visually impaired people, please
contact Cynthia Bennett by email at bennec3 at uw.edu or by phone at
(206) 221-3147. We anticipate running the study in early March, so if
you don't mind giving us your overall Monday-Friday availability
during that time when you contact us with your interest or questions,
that would be great. Please note that we cannot ensure the
confidentiality of information sent via email.


-- 
Cindy Bennett
Secretary: National Association of Blind Students
Legislative Coordinator: National Federation of the Blind of Washington

B.A. Psychology, UNC Wilmington
clb5590 at gmail.com