You can help improve future AAC interfaces by donating sentences from your history

We are collecting sentences written by users of Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) interfaces. These sentences will be used to help improve AAC text entry interfaces. Contributed sentences will become part of a public data set. This data set will be available for download by researchers working to improve AAC text entry interfaces.

Participant requirements:

• You must be 18 years of age or older
• You must use an AAC interface for at least some of your communication needs
• You must use an AAC interface that logs your writing to a simple text file
• You must not have a cognitive impairment

Details:

You will need to install our custom application on your computer. The application runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux operating systems. You will point the application at a text file of things you have written using your AAC interface. You can then select whatever sentences you would like to share with the project. You can read more about our data collection and privacy policies here.

If you would like to volunteer to take part, or to find out more, please contact Keith Vertanen at [email protected]

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

This study is being conducted by:

• Dr. Keith Vertanen from the Department of Computer Science at Michigan Technological University. Dr. Vertanen is an expert on text input by people with diverse abilities. He contributes to the open-source AAC text entry interfaces Dasher and Nomon. He has been a consultant for Tobii Dynavox, helping to improve gaze-based text input. He is a recipient of a National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award to investigate context-aware AAC text input.
• Will Wade, PGDip, Bsc (Hons) is a Senior AAC Consultant at the Ace Centre. He leads access assessments for individuals across the northwest of England. He teaches on a Masters course in Assistive Technology at Manchester Metropolitan University.
• Owen Kent is an entrepreneur and researcher focusing on assistive technologies. A graduate of UC Berkeley, he has over seven years of experience advising engineering teams ranging from high school students to postdocs building technology for people with disabilities.

The Michigan Tech Institutional Review Board (IRB) has approved this research project (IRB #1708491).