Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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Would a blind person be able to read braille with their palm? (self.Blind)
submitted by Psymonthe2nd
Hi, I was just curious about how blind/visually impaired people read Braille. Must you read with your fingertips, or would it be possible to feel points with your palm?
Thanks!
Thanks!
ZippyTWP 2 points 4y ago
I really don't see how, personally. I suppose it's possible, but you have to have a lot of tactile sensitivity, and your fingers especially have to be able to discern the dots individually to know the letter, number, piece of punctuation, etc.
Remember, Braille is just more than the alphabet and numbers, you've got punctuation, contractions and shortforms. For example, some men's rooms have m, e, n, spelled out, but some have m and the Braille character for "en" to keep it two characters. It would make it pretty challenging to read standard Braille font size with your palm.
Your palm would also read more than the letter. Think of it this way: if you're reading a book, you have to focus on one word, not the entire page at once. Same thing for palm vs finger.
Remember, Braille is just more than the alphabet and numbers, you've got punctuation, contractions and shortforms. For example, some men's rooms have m, e, n, spelled out, but some have m and the Braille character for "en" to keep it two characters. It would make it pretty challenging to read standard Braille font size with your palm.
Your palm would also read more than the letter. Think of it this way: if you're reading a book, you have to focus on one word, not the entire page at once. Same thing for palm vs finger.
Psymonthe2nd [OP] 1 points 4y ago
So what if instead the characters are enlarged, so that only one character is felt at a time?
quanin 2 points 4y ago
I'm not u/ZippyTWP, but if you don't mind the intrusion, that would be rather quite impractical. Braille is already considerably bulky in its current form. A textbook that would only be one volume in print can easily be 5 or 6 volumes in braille.
that being said, it's not a size of the characters thing. It's a tactile sensitivity thing. Your fingers are almost always going to be more precise. If anything, assuming you could actually do it that way, palm reading would be slower.
that being said, it's not a size of the characters thing. It's a tactile sensitivity thing. Your fingers are almost always going to be more precise. If anything, assuming you could actually do it that way, palm reading would be slower.
Psymonthe2nd [OP] 1 points 4y ago
Ok, the reason I ask is because I am working on a project for school that involves haptic feedback from a computer. So the idea I have with it is to translate, say just one word, into it's Braille representation and output that using haptic feedback. What I was curious about is how difficult it would be to read oversized characters with your palm versus traditional methods. It is difficult to simulate the proper representation of Braille characters with the current haptic feedback system I have available to me, which lead to my idea of just oversizing them.
quanin 2 points 4y ago
Yeah, that's not going to be very practical. Haptic feedback is great for a good many things, but the entire concept of braille is that it's raised up from the paper/surface it's put on. Haptic can't, to my knowledge, project that kind of 3d feedback you'd need for that.
For example: electronic braille displays exist, wherein you can connect them to a phone/tablet/computer and have braille output to use as opposed to speech. Rather than haptic feedback, the displays use a series of pins that come out of the display area to form the characters you're reading. To that end, you'd only actually pay attention to the things you'd need to, and if the output changes, the pins are reallocated to reflect that change. I'm no expert, but I don't think you can get that precise with haptic.
For example: electronic braille displays exist, wherein you can connect them to a phone/tablet/computer and have braille output to use as opposed to speech. Rather than haptic feedback, the displays use a series of pins that come out of the display area to form the characters you're reading. To that end, you'd only actually pay attention to the things you'd need to, and if the output changes, the pins are reallocated to reflect that change. I'm no expert, but I don't think you can get that precise with haptic.
KillerLag 1 points 4y ago
You need a sensitive body part that is capable of discriminating very small dots. While fingetips is the most easily accessible, other sensitive body parts are possible.
Here is an article from 2013 where some people learned to read Braille with their lips.
https://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/17/world/asia/hong-kong-blind-student-braille-lips/index.html
"In actual fact, the lips, tongue, and fingertips are particularly adept at spatial discrimination — they can perceive two points that are only 1-3 millimeters apart, according to the classic anatomy text, Field's Anatomy, Palpation and Surface Markings. In comparison, the legs or back of the hands can only detect two points with a separation of more than 50-100 millimeters."
A coworker of mine once taught someone (a nun) to read a braille Bible with their tongue, although I never met that person myself.
Here is an article from 2013 where some people learned to read Braille with their lips.
https://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/17/world/asia/hong-kong-blind-student-braille-lips/index.html
"In actual fact, the lips, tongue, and fingertips are particularly adept at spatial discrimination — they can perceive two points that are only 1-3 millimeters apart, according to the classic anatomy text, Field's Anatomy, Palpation and Surface Markings. In comparison, the legs or back of the hands can only detect two points with a separation of more than 50-100 millimeters."
A coworker of mine once taught someone (a nun) to read a braille Bible with their tongue, although I never met that person myself.
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