Touching Space: Accessible Map Exploration Through Conversational Audio-Haptic Interaction

2026-04-16

AI Summary

This work addresses the limitations of existing navigation aids in supporting blind and low-vision users to construct comprehensive cognitive maps prior to travel. The paper proposes an end-to-end accessible system that, for the first time, integrates tactile feedback with conversational voice interaction, enabling users to interactively explore and understand the spatial layout of unfamiliar environments through touch and natural language queries on commodity devices. By synergistically combining map data retrieval, a tactile interface, speech recognition, and conversational AI, the system delivers an efficient and barrier-free experience for pre-trip spatial comprehension. Evaluated on off-the-shelf hardware, it significantly enhances users’ ability to form accurate mental representations of target environments before physical navigation.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: AI for Accessibility
• Intelligent Robots: Localization, Mapping, and Navigation
• Planning, Routing, and Scheduling: Optimization of Spatio-temporal Systems

Application Category

• Search and Retrieval-Augmented AI: Assisted, interactive, and conversational search
• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: User modeling and simulation for interactive and conversational systems
• Systems and Infrastructure for Web, Mobile and WoT: Applied ML and AI for Web-based mobile applications

Abstract

Most existing assistive navigation tools focus on providing real-time guidance for Blind and Low-Vision (BLV) people, but few support building a holistic spatial understanding of unfamiliar environments before travel. Such cognitive map construction (e.g., knowing that a fountain is south of a tower and west of a hotel) is important for pre-travel planning, yet remains underexplored in prior work. To address this gap, we present Touching Space, an end-to-end system that retrieves map data for a target place and loads it into a frontend interface for exploration. The system combines haptic and audio feedback: users explore spatial layouts through touch and ask spoken questions to a conversational agent during exploration. Touching Space contributes a conversational interface that supports BLV users in building cognitive maps on commodity hardware.

Problem

• cognitive map construction
• accessible navigation
• Blind and Low-Vision
• spatial understanding
• pre-travel planning

Innovation

• conversational interface
• audio-haptic interaction
• cognitive map construction
• accessible navigation
• blind and low-vision assistance