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Computational Thinking (CT) captures the mental processes used to model and solve problems using a computational processes. While often connected to programming, CT is a core problem-solving skill, which has been advocated by educational researchers as a core skill, at par with reading and comprehension. A variety of learning environments have been proposed to aid young learners in acquiring knowledge of CT. The majority of such environments are highly visual, linking the process of solving a problem computationally to the process of building a graphical representation of an algorithm, e.g., in the form of a graphical jigsaw puzzle. The algorithms are often used to produce a visual output, e.g., animations. The highly visual models have been shown to be inaccessible to young learners with visual disabilities. This paper provides a review of the literature, which addresses the challenges of learning CT by young learners with visual disabilities. The survey offers also a series of recommendations on the effective design of accessible programming learning environments for young learners with visual disabilities. The paper provides an understanding of the current state of the art, along with the identification of promising directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Self-driving, 'autonomous' vehicles (AVs) promise to change the world in profound ways. The suggested benefits include safety, efficiency and accessibility. However, researchers and others have been quick to raise questions about wider implications for mobility and urban environments and responsible development of the technology. In a discussion that has been dominated by science, engineering and narrow questions of ethics, there is a need to draw attention to the old questions of politics: Who wins? Who loses? Who decides? Who pays? AVs will not be defined by their supposed autonomy; they will be defined by a set of social relationships. The special collection that this paper accompanies brings together research from a range of disciplines to explore the politics of autonomous vehicles and provide a foundation for ongoing investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present century faces developmental fallout as vulnerability and risk mount on the global systems due to climate change, urbanisation, and population ageing. Moreover, population ageing is gaining a stronger hold in urban areas, and so are climate change and related shocks and stresses. Consequently, repercussions for the weakest sections of society – including the elderly – remain under academic consideration. In this context, the paper aims to understand the perilous predicament of older people due to the occurrence and interaction between climate change, urbanisation, and population ageing. This review investigates the underpinnings of the nature of the interaction among the three phenomena; and discerns how as a result of the interaction, various climate change related shocks and stresses affect older people in urban settings. It emerges that these three phenomena exhibit: concurrence; a positive trend of growth; and a cyclic pattern of interaction with four linkages, implying (i) rapid urbanisation is fuelling climate change, (ii) climate change is impacting urban areas, (iii) older people are increasing in urban areas, and (iv) urbanisation provides opportunities and barriers for older people. This interplay further discloses that older people stand vulnerable and at heightened risk from climate change related stressors in urban areas. These understandings highlight the need to ensure that urban environments remain age-friendly even in the face of climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moving between devices is omnipresent, but not for people with disabilities or those who require specific accessibility options. Setting up assistive technologies or finding settings to overcome a certain barrier can be a demanding task for people without technical skills. Context-sensitive adaptive user interfaces are advancing, although migrating access features from one device to another is very rarely addressed. In this paper, we describe the knowledge-based component of the Global Public Inclusive Infrastructure that infers how a device shall be best configured at the operating system layer, the application layer and the web layer to meet the requirements of a user including possible special needs or disabilities. In this regard, a mechanism to detect and resolve conflicting accessibility policies as well as recommending preference substitutes is a main requirement, as elaborated in this paper. As the proposed system emulates decision-making of accessibility experts, we validated the automatic deduced configurations against manual configurations of ten accessibility experts. The assessment result shows that the average matching score of the developed system is high. Thus, the proposed system can be considered capable of making precise decisions towards personalizing user interfaces based on user needs and preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobile devices can be an important ally that improves the quality of life of visually impaired people by permitting greater independence in the execution of certain tasks and facilitating social inclusion. This work presents a systematic review that maps out the accessibility issues that visually impaired people experience when they interact with mobile devices. We identified 68 accessibility problems that were mapped into seven problem groups. This mapping was used to propose 28 recommendations to improve the accessibility of mobile devices. This analysis identified the persistence of certain accessibility problems such as the difficulty of typing on keyboards but also finds the emergence of new challenge such as the failure to recognize gesture-based interactions that demand more extensive training for users. This work is important because it provides an overview of accessibility problems that people with visual disabilities experience with mobile devices and proposes a number of accessibility recommendations to guide future studies. The main contribution of this paper is the mapping of accessibility problems into categories and the development of recommendations for identified problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As elements of culture and also as social-cultural phenomena, religion and denomination are the sources of creating change, difference and contrast in various places. Although indifference has been practically the approach adopted toward religion and its belongings in the contemporary world and today's human life, the religious and Islamic discussions have been among the important issues drawing a lot of attentions from the contemporaries in the theoretical arena. Islam has paid a particular attention to the house as the place of living and calmness for the human beings and believes in certain conditions for it. The theoretical foundations of Islamic mindset are neglected in today's houses so they are in need of revitalization in their designs and redesigning based on the original Islamic patterns. Nowadays, spatial meaningfulness is among the most important solutions of granting quality to the architectural spaces, especially residential spaces, and the designers and architects are making efforts in the area of paying attention to such concepts as calmness that can subsequently lead to the psychological health. The environmental designers and planners have paid attention to the quality of spaces and the role of perceptional indicators in forming the various spaces with the development of the human communities and appearance of meanings' gaps in the constructed spaces. These are the spaces that induce a sense of tranquility and pleasure followed by a sense of attachment and identity to the audience mind and revive the feelings of being present and existent in them. In this article, the effect of the Islamic teachings on the architectural spaces and places as theoretical bases has been investigated in various areas. The current article has been conducted with the objective of investigating the Islamic architectural pattern related to the housing in the Holy Quran's ĀYĀT and the possibility of using it as an Islamic pattern as a result of doing research and exploration in the Holy Quran, Nemooneh Interpretation and relevant articles and books. The achievement of the Islamic pattern and methods for semantic qualification and their application to a place and creating of an environmental calmness followed by psychological health based on the Islamic teachings in the residential spaces are among the findings underlined by the present research paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays usage paradigms of medical imaging resources are requesting vendor-neutral archives, accessible through standard interfaces, with multi-repository support. Regional repositories shared by distinct institutions, tele-radiology as a service at cloud, teaching, and research archives are illustrative examples of this new reality. However, traditional production environments have a server archive instance per functional domain where every registered client application has access to all studies. This paper proposes an innovator ownership concept and access control mechanisms that provide a multi-repository environment and integrates well with standard protocols. A secure accounting mechanism for medical imaging repositories was designed and instantiated as an extension of a well-known open-source archive. A new web service layer was implemented to provide a vendor-neutral solution compliant with modern DICOM Web protocols for storage, search, and retrieval of medical imaging data. The concept validation was done through the integration of proposed architecture in an open-source solution. A quantitative assessment was performed for evaluating the impact of the mechanism in the usual DICOM Web operations. This article proposes a secure accounting architecture able to easily convert a standard medical imaging archive server in a multi-repository solution. The proposal validation was done through a set of tests that demonstrated its robustness and usage feasibility in a production environment. The proposed system offers new services, fundamental in a new era of cloud-based operations, with acceptable temporal costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Barrier is widely used for synchronization in parallel programs. Since the process arrived earlier than others should wait at the barrier, the total processor utilization decreases. In this paper, to find the sources of the barrier waiting time, parallel programs are executed on the various grain sizes through execution-driven simulations. In simulation studies, we found that even if approximately equal amounts of work are distributed to each processor, all processes may not arrive at a barrier at the same time. The reasons are that the different numbers of cache misses and instructions within in partitioned grains result in the difference in arrival time of processors at the barrier. In this paper, the two-phased barrier is considered to reduce the blind waiting time in the traditional barrier scheme, which can be simply constructed by dividing one specific stage for the synchronization into two stages. On each stage, processes decide their stall or not, which is dependent on the current execution state of grains running on any given processors. Simulation results show that the reduced barrier waiting times attributed to the two-phased barrier contribute to the performance improvement of parallel programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an architecture developed in order to watch a movie in a cinema and follow subtitles in the mobile device. This architecture consists of a mobile application intended to display subtitles in an ordinary cinema, as well as a server containing the subtitles of those movies available at each cinema. The mobile device will connect to this server to download the desired subtitle. Once downloaded, the device is synchronized with the film running, using timestamps provided by the server, and will display the subtitles accordingly. This architecture can be used by any person interested in the movie subtitles, such as people who want to read the subtitles in another language, like a tourist, or by hearing impaired people. It must be pointed out that it is difficult to access movies at cinemas, as there are very few movie theaters where films are shown with subtitles regularly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increasing of the process data, process data-driven intelligent machining process planning is becoming more and more important in manufacturing industries. In the process data, the macro process contains abundant process design intent, which has important reuse value. However, existing 3D CAD model retrieval methods for macro process reuse are mainly on the premise of geometric similarity, which make them difficult to guarantee the reusability of the macro process associated with the similar results. In this paper, an effective retrieval approach of 3D CAD models for macro process reuse is presented. First, a process skeleton model is introduced to guide the structuralization of process data based on the macro process of existing parts. Then, a probability statistics approach is presented to map machining features of query part onto the macro process of existing part. Finally, process design intent-driven accessible machining region extraction is proposed, and then the part similarity assessment model based on the machining region is established to calculate the macro process similarity between query part and existing part. A prototype system has been developed to verify the effectiveness of the proposed approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines to what extent the 129 members of the Urban Public Libraries Council meet the Section 508 standards for accessibility under the Rehabilitation Act, the minimum acceptable standard for accessibility under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Using an HTML evaluation tool, WAVE, the HTML coding of the libraries' homepages was evaluated according to the Section 508 criteria for accessibility. After one-to-one deep examination to determine the accessibility of the library websites, the results tended to mirror other studies showing that most library websites have some coding deficiencies that limit the accessibility of the websites. Notably, only 7 of the 122 libraries that were surveyed had no Section 508 errors present with their homepages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accessible design principles should permeate virtually all phases of the application development cycle, using existing “best practices of software engineering” for accessibility purposes. This paper proposes a methodology for accessible design and testing that includes proven tools of software engineering, namely use cases and scenarios, to capture functional requirements. Guidelines developed through user testing and heuristics are made real using personas to exemplify accessibility requirements, reflecting a diversity of user capabilities and use contexts. For implementation and testing, test cases containing accessibility checkpoints are generated, based on the guidelines. Complementary to this methodology, expert reviews and user testing should be conducted for evaluation of the developed products and further refinement of the development process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a simulation-based approach, sorptive barrier design can be expressed as a nonlinear and mixed-integer optimization problem, and metaheuristic searching algorithms are suitable optimization methods to find optimal configurations of design. A recently proposed neighborhood field optimization (NFO) algorithm is applied to deal with the sorptive barrier design problem. NFO is originally proposed for continuous optimization problems, then, it is extended to binary NFO for discontinuous optimization problems. In this paper, integer NFO (INFO) is proposed by using forward and backward transformations. For the sorptive barrier design, NFO variants are compared with genetic algorithms and the best performer reported previously. Based on statistical analysis, NFO variants show better performance than GA variants in terms of accuracy and convergence speed, and INFO improves the best known results on all test instances. It can be concluded that the proposed INFO is suitable for the sorptive barrier design with significant performance improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an accessible interactive surface specifically designed for cerebral palsy users. The work context is an educational centre for disabled users, although the system presented can be used in other contexts. The main contributions are as follows: the table leaves enough leg room to fit in wheelchairs and has a half-circle radius cut-out in the top which lets users in wheelchairs sit closer to the tabletop. Table height can be easily adjusted to children or adults. The tabletop screen angle can be easily adjusted to adapt to different body postures and allow for user comfort. The tabletop does not compromise user safety as the surface is protected with strong Plexiglas. Furthermore, an assessment of accessibility has been carried out to analyse its appropriateness to fit users with different characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of the present work is to investigate the potential acceptance of a set of web interaction aids by older adults, in order to help them overcome difficulties associated with ageing and help them continue using the web as a source of information, communication and services. This paper presents a survey with older adults concerning their perceptions about a set of web interaction aids defined after a field observation study, a study with questionnaires and user tests of web applications. The survey involved 313 participants, of which about 44 % were older adults and elderly users. The results showed that the use of aids to support the interaction of older adults with the web promotes improvements in the interaction of older adults and younger users alike, which supports the argument for enhanced universal usability. Finally, it was possible to diagnose barriers that still remain and which aids had best acceptance by older adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accessibility and equal opportunities for all in the digital age have become increasingly important over the last decade. In one form or another, the concept of accessibility is being considered to a greater or smaller extent in most projects that develop interactive systems. However, the concept varies among different professions, cultures and interest groups. Design for all, universal access and inclusive design are all different names of approaches that largely focus on increasing the accessibility of the interactive system for the widest possible range of use. But, in what way do all these concepts differ and what is the underlying philosophy in all of these concepts? This paper aims at investigating the various concepts used for accessibility, its methodological and historical development and some philosophical aspects of the concept. It can be concluded that there is little or no consensus regarding the definition and use of the concept, and consequently, there is a risk of bringing less accessibility to the target audience. Particularly in international standardization the lack of consensus is striking. Based on this discussion, the authors argue for a much more thorough definition of the concept and discuss what effects it may have on measurability, conformance with standards and the overall usability for the widest possible range of target users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ambient-assisted living (AAL) is, nowadays, an important research and development area, foreseen as an important instrument to face the demographic aging. The acceptance of the AAL paradigm is closely related to the quality of the available systems, namely in terms of intelligent functions for the user interaction. In that context, usability and accessibility are crucial issues to consider. This paper presents a systematic literature review of AAL technologies, products and services with the objective of establishing the current position regarding user interaction and how are end users involved in the AAL development and evaluation processes. For this purpose, a systematic review of the literature on AAL was undertaken. A total of 1,048 articles were analyzed, 111 of which were mainly related to user interaction and 132 of which described practical AAL systems applied in a specified context and with a well-defined aim. Those articles classified as user interaction and systems were further characterized in terms of objectives, target users, users' involvement, usability and accessibility issues, settings to be applied, technologies used and development stages. The results show the need to improve the integration and interoperability of the existing technologies and to promote user-centric developments with a strong involvement of end users, namely in what concerns usability and accessibility issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With 75 foundation and 129 state universities, by the academic year of 2018-2019, there were approximately 8 million (7,740,502) university students in Turkey in the associate's, bachelor's, master's and doctoral categories. Considering that 0.6% approximately of these students (47,751) are disabled students, it is important to plan university campuses in line with criteria for disabled students. This study analyzed the existing landscape facilities and equipment status of the campus of Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University by focusing on disabled student perceptions. For this purpose, firstly, the landscape principles, elements and components of the campus area were assessed based on examination and observation supported by photography imagery. Additionally, the study included a survey carried out face to face with 40 disabled students. The perceptions of the students regarding campus planning and design were taken as a basis in the survey. The data obtained from the survey were subjected to a regression analysis in the SPSS 15.0 statistical software. With the analysis, by defining the satisfaction rates of the disabled students as the "dependent variable" and the survey criteria representing landscape equipment and facilities as the "independent variable," the statistical relationships between them were obtained. Field studies and statistical analysis results in the study confirm each other. According to the analysis, the satisfaction of students with disabilities according to campus parameters was found to be significant at P < 0.05 level. Consequently, it is aimed for the results of this study to make a contribution in the sustainable green campus planning and design of accessible universities aiming physical/environmental and socioeconomic sustainability centered around the disabled student. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evolution of wireless communication technologies opened the way to the definition of innovative e-Health systems aimed at providing a continuous and remote support to patients and new instruments to improve the workflow of the medical personnel. Nowadays, pervasive healthcare systems are a major step in this regard. The safety-critical systems on one hand and their failure in communication (i.e. sending and receiving messages) in other hand may lead to disaster results in the systems. Moreover, the need for high quality services in such systems, and the access to various types of Quality of Services such as reliability in software development has been increasing in the past years. In this paper, firstly we extend the core meta-model of the previously designed style for designing the structures of such systems in order to reach a high level of reliability in messaging. Secondly, their configuration mechanisms in controlling the communicative errors will be modeled using graph transformation rules. Finally, the correctness of the model is analyzed by model checking techniques. The results of the analysis show its high reliability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors have developed a simulator to help with the design and evaluation of assistive interfaces. The simulator can predict possible interaction patterns when undertaking a task using a variety of input devices and estimate the time to complete the task in the presence of different disabilities. This paper presents a study to evaluate the simulator by considering a representative application of searching icons, which was being used by able-bodied, visually impaired and mobility-impaired people. The simulator predicted task completion times for all three groups with statistically significant accuracy. The simulator also predicted the effects of different interface designs on task completion time accurately. The simulator is used to develop inclusive digital TV interfaces. A case study is presented to investigate accessibility requirements of a representative digital TV interface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In everyday life, people need to move, whether in business or leisure. Navigation requires spatial knowledge and ability to make decisions based on geographic information. Recently, powerful tools have been developed, enhancing the capabilities of geographical analysis and decision-making. This work presents a platform to handle and provide geographic information, including accessibility oriented features. This geographic information system (GIS) is part of a wider project, called SmartVision. The aim of this project is to create a system that allows blind users to navigate in the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro campus. The GIS platform, together with other modules of the SmartVision system prototype, provides information to blind users, assisting their navigation and giving alerts of nearby points-of-interest or obstacles. Together with the GIS platform, this paper also describes the handling of accessibility information by the SmartVision prototype, namely the Navigation Module, the Computer Vision Module and the Interface Module. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) by the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) has become the de-facto standard for accessibility on the Web. WCAG version 1.0 has become significant both as a practical tool and as an academic set of principles and is presently the basis of Web accessibility evaluations and guidelines in many countries. WCAG version 2.0 was released in 2008. This paper reports on a study that empirically validated the usefulness of using WCAG as a heuristic for website accessibility. Through controlled usability tests of two websites with disabled users ( N = 7) and a control group ( N = 6), it was found that only 27% of the identified website accessibility problems could have been identified through the use of WCAG 1.0. A similar analysis of conformance to WCAG 2.0 showed a marginal 5% improvement concerning identified website accessibility problems. Compensating for the low number of test subjects with confidence tests gave results that were still low (42% for WCAG 1.0 and 49% for WCAG 2.0, with 95% confidence). It is concluded from this that the application of WAI accessibility guidelines is not sufficient to guarantee website accessibility. It is recommended that future versions of the accessibility guidelines should be based on empirical data and validated empirically and that WAI expand their definition of accessibility to include 'usability for all' in accordance with ISO 9241-171:2008. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasingly, computers are becoming tools of communication, information exploring and studying for young people, regardless of their abilities. Scientists have been building knowledge on how blind people can substitute hearing or touch for sight or how the combination of senses, i.e., multimodalities, can provide the user with an effective way of exploiting the power of computers. Evaluation of such multimodal user interfaces in the right context, i.e., appropriate users, tasks, tools and environment, is essential to give designers accurate feedback on blind users' needs. This paper presents a study on how young blind people use computers for everyday tasks with the aids of assistive technologies, aiming to understand what hindrances they encounter when interacting with a computer using individual senses, and what supports them. A common assistive technology is a screen reader, producing output to a speech synthesizer or a Braille display. Those two modes are often used together, but the research studied how visually impaired students interact with computers using either form, i.e., a speech synthesizer or a Braille display. A usability test has been performed to assess blind grade-school students' ability to carry out common tasks with the help of a computer, including solving mathematical problems, navigating the web, communicating with e-mail and using word processing. During the usability tests, students were allowed to use either auditory mode or tactile mode. Although blind users most commonly use a speech synthesizer (audio), the results indicate that this was not always the most suitable modality. While the effectiveness of the Braille display (tactile user interface) to accomplish certain tasks was similar to that of the audio user interface, the users' satisfaction rate was higher. The contribution of this work lies in answering two research questions by analysing two modes of interaction (tactile and speech), while carrying out tasks of varying genre, i.e., web searching, collaboration through e-mail, word processing and mathematics. A second contribution of this work is the classification of observations into four categories: usability and accessibility, software fault, cognitive mechanism and learning method. Observations, practical recommendations and open research problems are then presented and discussed. This provides a framework for similar studies in the future. A third contribution of this work is the elaboration of practical recommendations for user interface designers and a research agenda for scientists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Visual programming tools allow users to create interactive media projects such as games and animations using visual representations of programming concepts. Although these tools have been shown to have huge potential for teaching children, research has shown that they may not be accessible for children with cognitive impairments, including those with autism spectrum condition. Therefore, this study proposes a set of recommendations for the design of accessible visual programming tools for children with autism spectrum condition. Semi-structured interviews with experts ( n = 7 ) were conducted and thematically analysed to identify initial recommendations. A second set of semi-structured interviews with a subset of the initial experts ( n = 3 ) were then conducted to validate and produce a final set of recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An extraordinary sensing ability of the SnP3-based single-material logical junction for harmful NOx gases was explored in the present work through a set of first-principles electronic structure calculations. As a sensing platform, a metal-semiconductor-metal lateral junction composed of a single material was designed based on the metallic/semiconducting characteristics of trilayer/monolayer SnP3. Lacking a Schottky barrier at the electrode-channel interface, the gas-specific charge transfer between the SnP3 layer and gas molecules was precisely detected based on the current-voltage characteristics. NOx gases with strong adsorption strength and charge transfer amount on the SnP3 substrate were shown to be particularly well detected in this manner, in terms of either the absolute magnitude of the current or negative differential resistance (NDR) at a reasonably small bias voltage as a sensing signal. This work will provide a new pathway to design a Schottky barrier-free metal-semiconductor junction for highly sensitive sensor applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Shared on-demand mobility services emerge at a fast pace, changing the landscape of public transport. However, shared mobility services are largely designed without considering the access needs of people with disabilities, putting these passengers at risk of exclusion. Recognising that accessibility is best addressed at the design stage and through direct participation of persons with disabilities, the objective of this study was to explore disabled users' views on the following emerging shared mobility services: (a) ride pooling, (b) microtransit, (c) motorbike taxis, (d) robotaxis, (f) e-scooter sharing, and (g) bike sharing. Methodolgy: Using an online mobility survey, we sampled disabled users' (1) views on accessibility, (2) use intention, and (3) suggestions for improving accessibility. The results reflect the responses of 553 individuals with different types of disabilities from 21 European countries. Results: Projected accessibility and use intention were greatest for microtransit, robotaxis, and ride pooling across different disabilities. In contrast, motorbike taxis, e-scooter sharing, and bike sharing were viewed as least accessible and least attractive to use, especially by persons with physical, visual, and multiple disabilities. Despite differences in projected accessibility, none of the shared mobility services would fulfil the access needs of disabled persons in their current form. Suggestions for increasing the accessibility of these services included (a) an ondemand door-to-door service, (b) an accessible booking app, (c) real-time travel information, and (d) the necessity of accommodating wheelchairs. Conclusions: Our findings highlight the need for improving both vehicles and service designs to cater for the access needs of persons with disabilities and provide policymakers with recommendations for the design of accessible mobility solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Globally, burn related deaths are disproportionately higher among children below 5 years of age compared to other age groups. Although rarely fatal, most burns in this group occur within homes specifically in kitchens. This study assessed the prevalence, risk factors and perceptions of caregivers regarding burns among children under 5 years in an urban slum in Kampala, Uganda. Methods: The study used an analytic cross-sectional design with quantitative and qualitative techniques. Quantitative data were collected using a structured questionnaire and observational checklist, while qualitative data involved use of a key informant interview guide. A total of 426 children were involved in the study, while 6 key informants namely an adult mother, teenage mother, community health worker, health practitioner, father and local leader were interviewed. A modified Poisson regression model was used to determine the correlates of burn injuries, prevalence rate ratios and 95% confidence intervals, while thematic analysis was used for qualitative data. Results: The prevalence of burns among under-fives was 32%, highest among those aged 24 to 35 months (39%), and least in those below 12 months (10%). Children with single parents (adj PR = 1.56 95% CI 1.07–2.29) and those from households in the middle and least poor wealth quintile (adj.PR = 1.72; 95% CI 1.02–2.89 and adj.PR = 1.77; 95% CI 1.02–3.05, respectively) were more likely to get burns compared to their counterparts in other quintiles. In households where flammables were safely stored, children were less likely to suffer from burn injuries (adj.PR = 0.61; 95% CI 0.44–0.83). Congestion, negligence of caregivers, and use of charcoal stoves/open cooking were the commonest determinants of burns. Although many caregivers offered first aid to burn patients, inadequate knowledge of proper care was noted. Crawling children were perceived as being at highest risk of burns. Conclusion: The prevalence of burns among children under 5 years was high, with several household hazards identified. Health education, household modification and applicable public health law enforcement are recommended to reduce hazards and minimise burn risks among children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A prominent characteristic of the COVID-19 pandemic is the marked geographic variation in COVID-19 prevalence. The objective of the current study is to assess the influence of population density and socio-economic measures (socio-economic ranking and the Gini Index) across cities on coronavirus infection rates. Israel provides an interesting case study based on the highly non-uniform distribution of urban populations, the existence of one of the most densely populated cities in the world and diversified populations. Moreover, COVID19 challenges the consensus regarding compact planning design. Consequently, it is important to analyze the relationship between COVID19 spread and population density. The outcomes of our study show that ceteris paribus projected probabilities to be infected from coronavirus rise with population density from 1.6 to 2.72% up to a maximum of 5.17–5.238% for a population density of 20,282–20,542 persons per square kilometer (sq. km.). Above this benchmark, the anticipated infection rate drops up to 4.06–4.50%. Projected infection rates of 4.06–4.50% are equal in cities, towns and regional councils (Local Authorities) with the maximal population density of 26,510 and 11,979–13,343 persons per sq. km. A possible interpretation is that while denser cities facilitate human interactions, they also enable and promote improved health infrastructure. This, in turn, contributes to medical literacy, namely, elevated awareness to the benefits associated with compliance with hygienic practices (washing hands), social distancing rules and wearing masks. Findings may support compact planning design principles, namely, development of dense, mixed use, walkable and transit accessible community design in compact and polycentric regions. Indeed, city planners should weigh the costs and benefits of many risk factors, including the COVID19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: Pakistan has one of the highest proportions of stunted children in the world, and the prevalence of stunting has been quite persistent over the years. This study aims to identify the factors behind the persistent prevalence of under-5 stunting in Pakistan, focusing on a child's access to food, health, care, and environment and the synergies among them. Subjects and methods: This study uses the country-representative data from the Demographic and Health Survey (2012–2013) for Pakistan. The estimations of the econometric models are carried out using ordinary least squares in STATA software. Results: Systematic synergies are found for the combination of food and environment when the sample is split into B40 (bottom 40%) and T60 (top 60%) wealth categories. For urban households, "food and environment" has a positive and significant coefficient under both definitions, showing the presence of synergies among food and environment sectors, as coefficients of their individual effects are insignificant. Under definition 2, synergies are also found for urban households in "care, environment and health". Under definition 1, the four-way interaction is significant for rural areas and at 3.5 it is significantly higher than the sum of the individual components, i.e., 2.3. Conclusions: We can conclude from the results that simultaneous improvements in multiple sectors are likely to have a much stronger impact on height-for-age than improvements in individual components. Therefore, the interventions aiming at stunting reduction should target multiple sectors instead of isolated interventions targeting one of the components. In particular, the results show that interventions aiming at stunting reduction should simultaneously consider access to adequate food and the environment, even if the primary sector of intervention is related to care or health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indoor air pollutants contribute to respiratory infections and asthma exacerbations in children. Rural Alaska Native children experience some of the highest U.S. rates of respiratory hospitalizations, which are associated with lack of in-home running water, household crowding, and woodstove use. In our previous study, in-home education and modifications reduced respiratory symptoms, and medical visits. In this study, we evaluated the feasibility of providing in-hospital environmental health consults for parents/guardians of children < 5 years old hospitalized at the Alaska Native Medical Center with respiratory infections or asthma. Environmental health specialists conducted 92 in-hospital consults and mailed Healthy Homes Toolkits to households. Local housing authorities completed low-cost home modifications in 47 eligible households. Participants reported changes in household behaviors that were specifically addressed in the consult or included in the Toolkit (e.g. allergen-impermeable pillow covers). Reported respiratory symptoms were decreased at the 6-month follow-up. Over a 2 year period the median overall medical costs for respiratory illness in study children were $70,500. Children with in-home piped water had half the daily overall medical costs than children without in-home piped water ($74 compared to $144). In this study, we demonstrate that it is feasible to provide environmental consults, mail Toolkits, and arrange home modifications to the homes of children hospitalized with respiratory illness. These findings, along with the high costs of medical care for these children, suggest in-hospital environmental health consults are a cost-effective intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital access to banking and financial systems is no longer merely a way to augment physical transactions or experiences. It is now the primary way that consumers interact with banking and financial services. As a result, it is essential and equitable that full digital access to these services be provided for people with disabilities. Building on a recently published survey that investigated the accessibility issues within banking and financial systems for blind users, this evaluation of 100 banking and financial websites in the USA provides a current analysis of the broader state of banking and finance website accessibility for people with disabilities. The results of our research not only document these current findings as an accessibility baseline for banking and finance websites but also reveal common problems and strategies that may benefit the banking and finance industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recurrent use of the Housing Enabler instrument has highlighted methodological challenges of broader scientific interest, namely interactions between personal functional capacity (P) and exposures to features (here potential barriers) in the built housing environment (E). This study aimed to propose and illustrate an analytic approach, separating P × E interaction effects (here accessibility problems) from main effects of P and E, in studies where P and P × E are strongly interrelated. Four datasets representing different populations of older people in the context of housing were used. The datasets (N = 1910) comprised data on P, E and P × E interactions as well as health-related variables. A two-step analytic procedure was performed: (1) a measure of environmental barriers net of functional capacity was obtained from residuals of linear regression analysis between P (independent) and P × E (dependent); (2) logistic regression analyses with self-rated general health and I-ADL, respectively, as dependent variables to explore interaction effects using the P × E residuals from the previous step. The association between P and P × E was similar across the four datasets (r ≥ 0.80, p < 0.001). In the logistic regression analyses, including P, both categorized and continuous P × E residuals were clearly associated with self-rated general health (p < 0.001 and p = 0.026), whereas the associations with I-ADL were less consistent (p = 0.275 and p = 0.002, respectively). The new two-step—instead of single-step—analytic approach proposed for investigating P × E interaction effects in studies involving health outcomes emerged as promising. The new approach has the potential of increasing the possibilities to adequately represent theoretical concepts and assumptions and rigorously test their effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increasing percentage of the population needs assistance services for a wide range of activities related to their independent living, which can be delivered either by humans or by machines. While cloud computing and emerging ICT solutions have introduced new types of services and service delivery paradigms, it remains costly and difficult to set up and market assistance services addressing the needs of very narrow end-user groups. The current work presents the design of a novel open-source infrastructure (web-based platform) which enables diverse stakeholders to easily set up web-based assistance-on-demand platform instances. Each of these AoD instances can be used by service providers to register and offer assistance-on-demand (AoD) services for catering individual needs of persons with disabilities. In this way, narrow end-user groups can be reached and enjoy a gamut of assistance services. The AoD platform is implemented in the context of a larger Global Public Inclusive Infrastructure (GPII), which is being developed in the context of the Prosperity4All project. The functional requirements for the design of the AoD infrastructure were iteratively fine-tuned through the definition and analysis of representative use models (sets of personas and use cases). The AoD platform architecture consists of two major components: front-end (GUI) and back-end (service infrastructure). Their implementation is mainly based on the Django framework which enables a Model–Template–View (MTV) software architectural pattern with highly configurable and flexible components. The evaluation of a demonstration instance of the AoD platform with end-users identified its advantages and pointed out additional functionality needed: multi-language, multi-modality, embedded social media feeding, dedicated menu for highly flexible service, etc. The overall perceived usefulness of the specific demonstration AoD platform instance that underwent evaluation was higher than 80%. The proposed AoD platform provides a flexible and sufficiently generic web-based infrastructure for the cost-effective setup, registration and web publication of services that can accommodate a highly diverse range of assistance needs. Furthermore, it is suitable for use by a wide range of different stakeholder/user groups interested in addressing the needs of persons with disabilities or otherwise at risk of exclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overall objective of this work is to review the assistive technologies that have been proposed by researchers in recent years to address the limitations in user mobility posed by visual impairment. This work presents an "umbrella review." Visually impaired people often want more than just information about their location and often need to relate their current location to the features existing in the surrounding environment. Extensive research has been dedicated into building assistive systems. Assistive systems for human navigation, in general, aim to allow their users to safely and efficiently navigate in unfamiliar environments by dynamically planning the path based on the user's location, respecting the constraints posed by their special needs. Modern mobile assistive technologies are becoming more discrete and include a wide range of mobile computerized devices, including ubiquitous technologies such as mobile phones. Technology can be used to determine the user's location, his relation to the surroundings (context), generate navigation instructions and deliver all this information to the blind user. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study inquires the possible creation of a sense of a place in coffee houses for the disabled people as public places. The physical characteristics of a space are the main factors allowing all people including the disabled ones as well to perceive that place properly and within the “person, place and interaction process” framework. The place attachment, which can be defined as the main emotional bond between space and the users, is heavily influenced by the individualistic experiences and reactions whether they are ordinary or differently abled. In order to initiate a place attachment, spaces should be designed in a way that they respect the occupant’s perception, feelings, memories, senses and their physical abilities to enable them to develop a sense of belonging and ownership. Therefore, creating designs which foster people’s construction process of sense of a place that comprises the concept of identity and sense of belonging, is among the essential issues for realizing place attachment in architecture and design of public spaces. In our contemporary world, there are settings that possess these qualities; contrariwise there are more architectural and urban spaces which ignore these qualities and their benefits for people, especially for the disabled ones. Relatedly, a building should offer people enough information for perceiving it and with its physical features should also support the experiences that occur in it. There is a strong link between memorable events and the space where those events occur. An environment which provides outstanding and meaningful ambiance by its architectural characteristics can establish a sense of a place. Disabled people often have less opportunities to experience the spaces properly compared to others because their limitations are not taken into consideration when designing the public spaces. Therefore, the design process of public spaces should involve the basic needs of disabled people. In order to propose a typology for traditional coffee houses, this research aims to define and discuss the place attachment experience of disabled people in public spaces. The study begins with an overview of identifying different types of disabilities and special needs, and an introductory discussion of how space attachment can help to meet those needs. Therefore, the physical, social and typological aspects of traditional coffee houses were evaluated in terms of location, space organization and functions by considering the profiles of disabled users. Methodologically, this is a case study, which has a mixed research design including qualitative and quantitative research instruments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Touch screen interfaces are increasingly more popular. However, they lack haptic feedback, making it harder to perform certain tasks, such as text entry, where users have to constantly select one of many small targets. This problem particularly affects older users, whose deteriorating physical and cognitive conditions, combined with their unfamiliarity with technology, can discourage them from using touch devices. The goal of this work was to thoroughly understand older adults touch typing behavior, in order to develop text-entry solutions more appropriate to their needs, which will enhance their typing performance. On a first phase, a baseline QWERTY keyboard and five different variants were developed that mostly used a text prediction algorithm to suggest the most probable keys or words. These keyboards were evaluated on a baseline study with 20 younger adults in order to find the most promising ones, which were then used in a study with 20 older adults. The older adults study revealed more about their typing behavior and therefore created four new variants to be used in a simulation study. Results show that visual changes should be kept to a minimum; touch points should be shifted upward and to the opposite side of the hand used to type; single touch keyboards perform better than multi-touch; and omitting keys below a certain time threshold minimizes accidental insertions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relocation in very old age is considered to be a major life event and a move could be triggered by many different economic, social, health-related, or environmental reasons. Based on the notion of person-environment (P-E) fit as expressed in the Ecological Theory of Ageing, the aim of this prospective study over 4 years was to explore which aspects of housing and health predict relocation to ordinary or special housing among very old people. At baseline, the participants (80-89 years old) lived alone in ordinary housing in Sweden ( N = 384). Data collection at home visits included assessments and observations on aspects of objective and perceived housing as well as on aspects of health. After 4 years, 18 % ( n = 70) of the participants had moved, either to ordinary housing ( n = 24) or to special housing ( n = 46). Cox regression models showed dependence in cleaning, perceived functional independence, and living in a one-family house to predict moves to ordinary housing. Dependence in cooking, cognitive deficits, and accessibility problems predicted moves to special housing. In conclusion, aspects of housing and health are related to relocation in very old age, but in different patterns for relocation to ordinary housing and special housing, respectively. This kind of knowledge has practical implications for relocation counselling and societal planning targeting very old people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inclusive design aims at objects and environments that are accessible, usable and comfortable for all people throughout their entire lifespan. In architecture, this aim is usually associated with physical accessibility. Yet acoustic qualities may considerably impact usability and comfort as well, especially in spaces for listening. This case study explores the notion of acoustic comfort for all in the context of university education. One auditorium, situated in a historic building and subject to renovation in the near future, is studied in detail: acoustic obstacles are identified in collaboration with user/experts and are measured in situ; specific interventions are proposed in consultation with building professionals, technicians and conservation specialists and are tested using dedicated acoustic simulation software. The study draws attention to the importance of acoustic comfort for all and offers a first view of which solutions are possible and desirable and how these can be obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a review of the book "Teaching Every Student in the Digital Age: Universal Design for Learning," by David H. Rose and Anne Meyer.

We present an approach to providing broad-based accessibility to graphical applications by employing the capabilities of the Eclipse platform and aspect-oriented programming (AOP) in a way that leverages the strengths of each. We first describe the Eclipse platform and the variety of frameworks that can be useful to the effort. We also present the advantages of aspect-oriented programming and contrast aspect-oriented programming with object-oriented programming (OOP). Then, we discuss how to use the Eclipse frameworks and AOP in the design of accessible Eclipse-based applications and share some situations of when to leverage these frameworks and when we do not from the perspective of robustness and efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a case study about the access for people with disabilities to public buildings and facilities in Bloemfontein, South Africa. Multidirectional interconnections between individuals and their environment assumed by the ecological theory; Evaluation of the accessibility features such as availability of parking, ramps and lifts as well as accessible corridors and toilets; Description of the accessibility of recreation facilities and cultural venues in the city.