An Interdisciplinary HCI Research Group
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The AXLE Lab is an interdisciplinary research group within the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. We develop technology solutions to support, enhance, understand, and celebrate Ability in its many forms. The research we conduct aims to improve the quality of human lives through the thoughtful application of technology and social interventions.
If you're interested in getting involved, get in touch!
The projects in the lab can generally be thought of as Accessibility + X, where X equals one or more of our project areas:
We are surrounded by devices. How can we make interactive and "smart" technologies work better together with us? Our work aims to explore this problem space by both creating novel interactive experiences and examining the complexities of interaction for people who represent the diversity of human ability.
Today, cities are rethinking their portfolio of mobility services so that they can create systems that are more accessible, sustainable, and equitable. These include providing a variety of options such as public transit, rideshare services, electric scooter- and bike-share programs, ground-based delivery robots, and eventually autonomous vehicles. Our research objective is to develop and test methods for municipalities to do community-driven design and deployment of innovative, accessible, and integrated mobility services.
We are working to develop and understand technology supports for enabling full experiences in competitive activities and games. Our current projects involve overcoming barriers to participation and enhancing the experience of capturing and using analytics to achieve excellence.
Broadly scoped, our projects in this area aim to improve the overall experience of virtual, augmented, and mixed reality applications. We are particularly interested in overcoming input and interaction challenges imposed by today's VR interfaces.
Yunzhi Li, Franklin Mingzhe Li, and Patrick Carrington
Breaking the "Inescapable" Cycle of Pain: Supporting Wheelchair Users’ Upper Extremity Health Awareness and Management with Tracking Technologies
Proceedings of ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2023) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
Siyou Pei, Alexander Chen, Chen Chen, Franklin Mingzhe Li, Megan Fozzard, Hao-Yun Chi, Nadir Weibel, Patrick Carrington, and Yang Zhang
Embodied Exploration: Facilitating Remote Accessibility Assessment for Wheelchair Users with Virtual Reality
Proceedings of ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2023) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
Franklin Mingzhe Li, Lotus Zhang, Maryam Bandukda, Abigale Stangl, Kristen Shinohara, Leah Findlater, and Patrick Carrington
Understanding Visual Arts Experiences of Blind People
Proceedings of ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2023) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
Frank Elavsky, Lucas Nadolskis, and Dominik Moritz
Data Navigator: An accessibility-centered data navigation toolkit
IEEE Visualization and Visual Analytics Conference (IEEE VIS 2023) Links: [PDF] [HTML]
Jiachen Li, Bingrui Zong, Tingyu Cheng, Yunzhi Li, Elizabeth D. Mynatt, and Ashutosh Dhekne
Privacy vs. Awareness: Relieving the Tension between Older Adults and Adult Children When Sharing In-home Activity Data
Proceedings fo the ACM on Human Computer Interaction (CSCW 2023) Links: [doi] [PDF]
Sanika Moharana, Patrick Carrington, and Christina N. Harrington
Inclusive Design of CUIs Across the Intersection of Race and Disability
ACM CHI 2023 Workshop. CUI@CHI: Inclusive Design of CUIs Across Modalities and Mobilities (CHI 2023) Links: [PDF]
Christina N. Harrington, Aashaka Desai, Aaleyah Lewis, Sanika Moharana, Anne Spencer Ross, and Jennifer Mankoff
Working at the Intersection of Race, Disability and Accessibility
Proceedings of ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2023) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
Franklin Mingzhe Li, Michael Xieyang Liu, Yang Zhang, and Patrick Carrington
Freedom to Choose: Understanding Input Modality Preferences of People with Upper-body Motor Impairments for Activities of Daily Living
Proceedings of ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2022) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
JiWoong Jang, Yunzhi Li, and Patrick Carrington
”I Should Feel Like I’m In Control”: Understanding Expectations, Concerns, and Motivations for the Use of Autonomous Navigation on Wheelchairs
Proceedings of ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2022) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
Jingyang Liu, Yunzhi Li, and Mayank Goel
A semantic-based approach to digital content placement for immersive environments
The Visual Computer ( 2022) Links: [doi] [PDF]
Frank Elavsky, Cynthia Bennett, and Dominik Moritz
How accessible is my visualization? Evaluating visualization accessibility with Chartability
Eurographics Conference on Visualization (Eurovis 2022)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
Nikolas Martelaro, Patrick Carrington, Sarah Fox, and Jodi Forlizzi
Designing an Inclusive Mobile App for People with Disabilities to Independently Use Autonomous Vehicles
Proceedings of Conference on Automotive User Interfaces and Interactive Vehicular Applications (AutomotiveUI 2022)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
Franklin Mingzhe Li, Franchesca Spektor, Meng Xia, Mina Huh, Peter Cederberg, Yuqi Gong, Kristen Shinohara, and Patrick Carrington
“It Feels Like Taking a Gamble”: Exploring Perceptions, Practices, and Challenges of Using Makeup and Cosmetics for People with Visual Impairments
Proceedings of ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2022) Links: [doi] [PDF] [HTML]
Franklin Mingzhe Li, Cheng Lu, Zhicong Lu, Patrick Carrington, Khai N. Truong
An Exploration of Captioning Practices and Challenges of Individual Content Creators on YouTube for People with Hearing Impairments
Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction; Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW 2022)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
Franklin Mingzhe Li, Jamie Dorst, Peter Cederberg, Patrick Carrington
Non-Visual Cooking: Exploring Practices and Challenges of Meal Preparation by People with Visual Impairments
Proceedings of ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2021)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
Rushil Khurana, Ashley Wang, Patrick Carrington
Beyond Adaptive Sports: Challenges & Opportunities to Improve Accessibility and Analytics
Proceedings of ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2021)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
Cynthia L. Bennett, Emily Ackerman, Bonnie Fan, Jeffrey Bigham, Patrick Carrington, Sarah Fox
Accessibility and The Crowded Sidewalk: Micromobility's Impact on Public Space
Proceedings of Designing Interactive Systems Conference 2021 Best Paper Honorable Mention (Top 5%)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
Xingyu Liu, Patrick Carrington, Xiang'Anthony' Chen, Amy Pavel
What Makes Videos Accessible to Blind and Visually Impaired People?
Proceedings of ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing (CHI 2021)
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
[VIDEO]
Saiganesh Swaminathan, Yellina Yim, Scott E Hudson, Cynthia L. Bennett, Patrick Carrington
From Tactile to NavTile: Opportunities and Challenges with Multi-Modal Feedback for Guiding Surfaces during Non-Visual Navigation
Proceedings of ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing (CHI 2021).
Links: [doi]
[PDF]
[HTML]
[VIDEO]
Recent News
08.12.21
As of August 12 we have officially moved the lab to a new space at 5th and Craig St.
07.15.21
We had two papers accepted at ASSETS 2021 this year. The first paper was about challenges and opportunities to support blind and visually impaired people while cooking. The second paper was about improving access to adaptive sports by understanding the barriers to the growth and development of the sports and the communities that support them.
05.08.21
We had two papers presented at CHI 2021 this year. The first paper was about NavTiles, a multimodal ground surface tile designed to support navigation and spatial awareness for people with vision impairments. The second paper was about what makes videos accessible according to blind and visually impaired users on YouTube.