UTA professor earns NSF grants to study human-computer interaction

Grants aim to enhance the lives of the visually impaired and those with ADHD

2024-10-10

(Press-News.org) Fillia Makedon, a Distinguished Professor in the Computer Science and Engineering Department at The University of Texas at Arlington, has been awarded two new National Science Foundation (NSF) grants involving human-computer interaction. In one, she will study extended reality to assess attention levels in people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorders (ADHD); in the other, she will look at how human-robot interaction could help visually impaired persons perform job duties remotely from home using telerobotic technologies.

The NSF awarded Dr. Makedon $440,758 through its Early-Concept Grants for Exploratory Research program, which supports work in its early stages on untested, but potentially transformative research ideas or approaches.

In the first project, Makedon will apply extended reality (XR) technology to assess attention deficit and other cognitive functions, with a goal of creating standardized, yet adaptable, virtual scenarios to provide more accurate and comprehensive cognitive profiles to support traditional assessments. This could be especially helpful for underserved populations and people in remote areas without easy access to professional services.

XR is a combination of real and virtual environments—in this case, virtual reality and mixed reality—which creates an immersive environment that can present a variety of tasks, guided by an avatar, that adapt based on real-time performance data. Results with XR are more accurate than current traditional observation methods, leading to better and reproducible assessments of cognition.

“Extended reality will allow us to record not just how a person responds to questions or tasks verbally, but how they respond physically,” Makedon said. “When their actions are slow or they don’t respond, that’s a good indication that they’ve lost focus. Virtual reality is easy to use, more reproducible and adaptive to situations. Beyond just diagnosing attention deficit disorders, this method could also be used for training to enhance attention.”

For the second project, Makedon is teaming up with Nick Gans, a principal research scientist and head of the Autonomation and Intelligent Systems Division at the UTA Research Institute, and Austin Lighthouse, a warehouse that employs and trains visually impaired and blind people. Together, they will explore the potential for people who are visually impaired to use telerobots to carry out physical tasks remotely. (With the telerobots, the human operator can receive sensor feedback and is in control of navigation and control.)

This would solve one of the barriers to employment for people who are visually impaired or blind: commuting to their workplace. Another work barrier is resistance by employers to hire visually impaired or blind people due to fears of liability if the employee is injured on the job.

Telerobotics could remove these barriers by allowing blind or visually impaired employees to work from home. Makedon and Gans will work with Austin Lighthouse staff to identify specific problems associated with telerobotic training and design an interface that can be used to safely and accurately train employees to use the technology. Their research will also provide an understanding of how visually impaired people perform physical tasks. Outcomes of this study may also impact persons with other types of disabilities who need to work from home.

“It is often difficult for people who are blind or visually impaired to commute to work, so it is important for us to find out if they can be productive from home and keep their jobs through telerobotics,” Makedon said. “Austin Lighthouse is very interested in exploring the use of robots to help their employees be successful. This could also be beneficial for the subjects, because the ability to obtain and keep a job could help ease feelings of isolation and frustration.”

These projects are the latest in a string of research by Makedon focused on improving lives through human-computer and human-robot interactions. She is the director of the Human-Centered Computing Lab and of the Motion Capture Lab at UTA, both of which focus on the use of assistive technologies to enhance human performance and improve quality of life.

These two new grants relate to another ongoing NSF grant from the Disability and Rehabilitation Engineering (DARE) program that focuses on educating people with mobility and spinal issues on how to interact with intelligent robots to achieve daily tasks, such as cooking or preparing to leave the house. For this study, Makedon is working with members of the Movin’ Mavs, UTA’s wheelchair basketball team.

About The University of Texas at Arlington (UTA)

Located in the heart of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, The University of Texas at Arlington is a comprehensive teaching, research, and public service institution dedicated to the advancement of knowledge through scholarship and creative work. With an enrollment of approximately 41,000 students, UT Arlington is the second-largest institution in the UT System. UTA’s combination of outstanding academics and innovative research contributes to its designation as a Carnegie R-1 “Very High Research Activity” institution, a significant milestone of excellence. The University is designated as a Hispanic Serving-Institution and an Asian American Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Institution by the U.S. Department of Education and has earned the Seal of Excelencia for its commitment to accelerating Latino student success. The University ranks as the No. 1 national public university in the U.S. for veterans (Military Times, 2024), No. 4 in Texas for advancing social mobility (U.S. News & World Report, 2025), and No. 6 in the United States for its undergraduate ethnic diversity (U.S. News & World Report, 2025). UT Arlington’s approximately 270,000 alumni occupy leadership positions at many of the 21 Fortune 500 companies headquartered in North Texas and contribute to the University’s $28.8 billion annual economic impact on Texas.

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UTA professor earns NSF grants to study human-computer interaction

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