EgressII focus group

In order to understand the relevance of the results for persons with development disabilities, a focus group was conducted. Participants included five instructors at The Arc who accompanied one or more participants in the Powell Station experiment, and one supervisor from The Arc (see protocol in Appendix).

Participants discussed and were then asked to rate the extent of their agreement with a number of statements about the usefulness of Talking Signs with persons with developmental disabilities. The rating was on a five point scale, with l=strongly disagree and 5=strongly agree.

1. “If people with developmental disabilities are already good at using Talking Signs, it can be expected that they will learn to travel new routes in places having Talking Signs more quickly and easily than if they did not have Talking Signs available.”

The mean response for this statement was 4.7. Participants pointed out that having redundant information was particularly helpful for this population.

2. “Some people with developmental disabilities could be expected to be able to independently travel short, unfamiliar routes in environments having Talking Signs. For example: A person working in Nordstroms, who uses Powell Station each day, might be asked to meet her aunt at the top of the Powell Station stairs which lead to Stockton Street, an exit which she has never used.”

The mean response for this statement was 4.2. However, participants pointed out that persons with developmental disabilities are not normally taught to explore independently and to take the risks associated with attempting to travel unfamiliar routes. They estimated that no more than 2-5% of clients of The Arc would ever be expected or permitted by caregivers to go somewhere independently without extensive prior instruction.

3. “Some people who learned to travel a route using Talking Signs would continue to receive benefit from use of Talking Signs on that route even though they had already learned to travel it.”

Participants asked that they be able to respond to this question in two ways; (a) for regularly traveled routes and (b) for infrequently traveled routes.

3a. For regularly traveled routes: The mean response for this statement was 3.3.

3b. For infrequently traveled routes: The mean response for this statement was 4.8.

4. “Instruction in use of Talking Signs would be best if it was integrated into the regular travel training program of persons with developmental disabilities.”

Participants were unanimous in strongly agreeing with the statement.

Participants raised the issue that persons with developmental disabilities would be likely to be more vulnerable to abuse or attack if they were made additionally conspicuous by their use of the Talking Signs technology. After some discussion, participants were asked to rate their agreement with the following statement:

5. “Even though persons with developmental disabilities may be more vulnerable when using the Talking Signs system, the advantages of the information provided by the system outweigh this disadvantages.”

Participants unanimously responded with a rating of 5.0. One participant (instructor) pointed out that a client of The Arc who was using the Talking Signs system was probably no more vulnerable than the instructor was when carrying her personal computer .

Participants discussed the proportion of persons with developmental disabilities who might be expected to benefit by using Talking Signs. They concluded that for clients of The Arc who have learned or could be expected to learn to travel independently on public transportation, probably 100% would be expected to benefit by using the Talking Signs system. They anticipated that the Talking Signs system would be equally helpful to readers and non-readers.

Many clients of The Arc do not travel independently because of cognitive, language, judgment or social/emotional problems. Participants estimated that approximately 20% of clients currently using paratransit service could learn to travel on regular transit if the Talking Signs system was available. This might be potentially true for persons with limited communication skills who cannot effectively request information or assistance.

Of the many applications of Talking Signs, (including access to automated teller machines (ATMs); identifying oncoming buses and streetcars; identifying addresses, streets and walk/don't walk interval at street crossings), the ones considered most important for and useful to persons with developmental disabilities were transit facilities, transit vehicle identification (Route number and Destination) and Next Stop messages.