This thesis examines the labour market experiences of a purposive sample of legally blind people in a medium-sized Canadian city. Relevant literature on disability, employment and stigma is reviewed, providing context for the thesis. Thematic analysis of qualitative data gathered from 18 in-depth face-to-face interviews of legally blind working-age participants provide rich narratives of their experiences in the labour market and society at large. The participants’ current and past employment situations are described and barriers to acceptance of their disability in the workforce are identified. Findings suggest that while perceived, enacted, and felt stigma constitute significant barriers to meaningful employment for the participants, many employ effective strategies to adapt to or resist stigmatizing treatment by others. Policy suggestions are provided to mitigate the impact of stigma on the lives of legally blind Canadians. The thesis concludes with suggestions for future directions of research in the area. / Graduate / 0629 / 0630 / 0626 / martha.jansenberger@gmail.com

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Šio darbo tikslas - išanalizuoti žmonių suregėjimo negalia padėtį visuomenėje, galimybes rasti darbą, visuomenės ir darbdavių požiūrį į neigalųjį žmogų, teisinę padėtį, fizinės aplinkos pritaikymą šiems žmonėms. Buvo siekiama rasti būdus Buvo sudaryta anketa ir apklausta 100 respondentų, turinčių regėjimo negalią. Buvo siekiama išsiaiškinti jų profesinės reabilitacijos problemas, kur jie dirba, kaip susirado darbą, kokia jų darbinės veiklos sritis, ar jų darbo aplinka yra jiems pritaikyta ir ar jie yra patenkinti savo darbu. kokioje dar veikloje dalyvauja šie žmonės ir kas jiems padeda buityje Taip pat siekiama išsiaiškinti ar efektyviai jiems padeda LASS, kokius įstatymus jie žino, kurie turėtų padėti jiems įsilieti į visuomenę ir ar jie gali save vadinti visaverčiais visuomenės nariais. Atlikus tyrima paaiškėjo svarbiausios kliūtys, trukdančios akliems ir silpnaregiams sėkmingai įsilieti į visuomenę ir bandoma rasti būdus kaip šias kliūtis įveikti. / The aim of this work is to analyse the situation of blind and visually imparred persons integration in society. In this work employments are called one of the most important elements of the social integration. I also research the improvement of blind and visually imparred people, their imployment in society, the law system of Lithuania, institutions that work for the welfore of partialy sighted persons rehabilitation system. Furthemore, I analize personal, social, physical situation, elements that limit the posssiblities of blind and visual imparred persons to integrate into society. I made special survays in order to investigate the employment situation of blind and visual imparred people who live in Vilnius. One hundred blind and visually imparred persons were investigated using the interwiews and also the questionaire method. The main results of my special survays are illustrated with charts and tables in the forth part of the work. After all the results that were analysed I have made conslussions that it is very hard for the blind and visually imparred people to integrate to society because of various reasons: law base, that takes care of partialy sighted people,people wrights and opportunities are created, but there are some imperfections that reduse the employment possibilities, the adaptability for the blind and visully imparred people. All mentionated reasons have influence on the social integration idea of the blind and visually imparred individuals. Moreover... [to full text]

Ištvermė, suvokiama kaip aerobinis darbingumas, yra svarbiausia iš visų su sveikata susijusių fizinių ypatybių. Šio tyrimo tikslas buvo įvertinti aklųjų ir silpnaregių aerobinės ištvermės ugdymo ypatumus, atliekant aerobinį krūvį. Tyrimai buvo atlikti Lietuvos kūno kultūros akademijos (LKKA) TFV katedroje. Tyrime dalyvavo aklieji ir silpnaregiai vyrai, iš Kauno sveikatos sporto klubo ir LAS Lietuvos aklųjų sąjungos. Jie buvo suskirstyti į dvi grupes sportuojantis ir nesportuojantys. Taip pat tyrime dalyvavo Lietuvos kūno kultūros akademijos studentai. Tikslas - nustatyti ir įvertinti sportuojančių ir nesportuojančių regos negalią turinčių asmenų ištvermės rodiklių kaitą priklausomai nuo negalios sunkumo laipsnio Uždaviniai: 1. Nustatyti ir įvertinti nesportuojančių regos negalią tiriamų asmenų ir įgaliųjų aerobinės ištvermės rodiklių kaitą atliekant 12min. bėgimo testą. 2. Nustatyti ir įvertinti sportuojančių neįgaliųjų, turinčių regos negalią, ištvermės rodiklių kaitą priklausomai nuo negalios sunkumo laipsnio. 3. Palyginti sportuojančių ir nesportuojančių aklųjų, silpnaregių ir nesportuojančių įgaliųjų aerobinės ištvermės rodiklius, 12 min. bėgimo testo metu. Visiems tiriamiesiems buvo atliktas Cooperio testas - 12 min. bėgimas. Tiriamiesiems bėgimo sąlygos vienodos. Tyrimo užduotis– kuo ilgesnį atstumą nubėgti per 12 min. Tiriamieji po trijų minučių apšilimo užduotį atliko bėgdami bėgtakiu. Kas minute buvo registruojamas pulso dažnis. Kiekvienas bėgikas galėjo... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Stamina, perceived as aerobic efficiency, is the most important from all physical peculiarities related with health. The purpose of this research was to evaluate training peculiarities of aerobic stamina of blind and weak-eyed persons, while exercising aerobic load. The researches were done in Lithuanian Academy of Physical Education TVF department (Department of Adapted Physical Activity). Blind and weak-eyed men from Kaunas Health Sport Club and LAS Lithuanian the blind union. They were split into two groups: those going in for sports and those do not going in for sports. Students from Lithuanian Academy of Physical Education participated in the research as well. Purpose - To measure and assess the change of stamina indexes of the disabled with sight disability persons going in for sports subject to the heaviness degree of the disability. 1. To measure and assess the change of aerobic stamina indexes of persons with sight disabilities going in for sports and not going in for sports and of healthy people while doing 12 min.-running test 2. To measure and assess the change of stamina indexes of the disabled with sight disability persons going in for sports subject to the heaviness degree of the disability. 3. To compare aerobic stamina indexes of blind persons, weak-eyed persons going in for sports and not going in for sports and healthy persons not going in for sports during the 12 min.-running test. Cooper test – 12 min. running was done to all the people under the... [to full text]

Aklųjų ir silpnaregių socializacijos galimybių plėtra taikant meninį ugdymą, įvairią kultūrinę veiklą, Lietuvoje buvo nuolat vykdoma. Tačiau apie suaugusių asmenų, turinčių regos negalią, teatrinį ugdymą ar jo taikymą siekiant neįgaliųjų tikslingesnės integracijos ir socializacijos į šiuolaikinę visuomenę informacijos, mokslinių tyrimų duomenų Lietuvai atgavus nepriklausomybę rašytiniuose šaltiniuose, atspindinčiuose neįgaliųjų meninį ugdymą, nerasta. Ši meno rūšis liko už organizacijų, kurių veiklos tikslai siejasi su asmenų, turinčių regos sutrikimus, meniniu ugdymu interesų ribų, nors radijas – bene vienintelis aklųjų ir silpnaregių langas į pažintį su išoriniu pasauliu. Šio tyrimo tikslas- nustatyti aklųjų ir silpnaregių socializacijos galimybių plėtrą ugdant radijo teatru. Uždaviniai: išanalizuoti mokslinę, metodinę literatūrą, susijusią su aklųjų ir silpnaregių suaugusiųjų socializacija ir radijo teatro vaidmeniu; ištirti aklųjų ir silpnaregių suaugusiųjų ugdymo ypatumus radijo teatre; nustatyti aklųjų ir silpnaregių suaugusiųjų individualias socializacijos galimybes ugdant radijo teatro priemonėmis. Tyrimo objektas - aklųjų ir silpnaregių socializacija radijo teatru. Hipotezė - aklųjų ir silpnaregių integracija į radijo spektaklių kūrybą padeda jiems greičiau socializuotis, teigiamai veikia aklųjų ir silpnaregių meninius gebėjimus. Tyrimo metodai: teoriniai – mokslinės, metodinės, tiflologinės literatūros analizė, palyginimas, apibendrinimas; empiriniai – atvejų... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / It has been pursuing a continuous process to develop socialization of the blind and partially-sighted with the help of artistical education, various cultural activities in Lithuania. However, there is no scientific data in any written source about theatrical education and its implement on purpose to integrate and get socialized the sight-disabled since regaining of Independency in Lithuania. This type of art remained within the deadline of organizations which aims were linked with artistical education of the sight-disabled. Indeed, this part of art is maybe the only opportunity to know life. The purpose of this research is to evaluate the development of socialization opportunities with the help of radio theatre. The tasks: to analize scientific, methodological literature associated with socialization of the blind and partially-sighted and the role of radio theatre; to analize educational particularity of the sight disabled adult in the radio theatre; to find out individual opportunities of socialization of the sight-disabled through radio theatre. The object of research is socialization of the blind and partially-sighted with the help of radio theatre. Hypothesis: integration of the blind and partally-sighted into creation of radio plays helps them socialize faster, positively influence their artistical talents. Research methods: theoretical – analysis, comparison and summary of scientific, methodological, tiphlological literature; empyrical – analysis of cases: the... [to full text]

Baigiamajame magistriniame darbe nagrinėjama tema – ikimokyklinio amžiaus aklųjų ir silpnaregių kalbos raidos ypatumai ( lyginamoji analizė). Sunku pervertinti kalbos plėtotės procese pagrindinių – regos ir klausos – analizatorių vaidmenį. Šių analizatorių sutrikimas labai stipriai įtakoja kalbinės veiklos vystymąsi ir suteikia jam tam tikrų ypatumų. Labai dažnai aklo iš prigimties asmens turimų sąvokų turinys kardinaliai skiriasi nuo reginčiųjų. Stokodami vieno iš pasaulio pažinimo būdų aklieji dažnai neadekvačiai vartoja turimas sąvokas. Aklas vaikas gali girdėti kalbą ir mėgdžiodamas jos mokosi. Kartais jis labiau už regintįjį yra motyvuotas ją vartoti, nes tai pagrindinis kanalas komunikuojant su kitais. Ar iš tikrųjų aklųjų kalbinė raiška skiriasi nuo normaliai matančių vaikų? Į šį klausimą bandoma atsakyti šiame magistro darbe. Tyrimo problema: ikimokyklinio amžiaus nereginčių ir silpnaregių vaikų kalbinė raida stokoja normalaus psichofiziologinio pagrindo. Šiuos trūkumus būtina kompensuoti, pasitelkus išlikusius sveikus analizatorius prieš tai tiksliai išsiaiškinus šios grupės vaikų kalbinės raidos pasiekimo skirtumus lyginant su sveikaisiais. Tyrimo objektas: ikimokyklinio amžiaus aklųjų ir silpnaregių bei gerai matančių vaikų kalbos raida ( lyginamoji analizė). Tyrimo tikslas: ištirti ikimokyklinio amžiaus aklųjų ir silpnaregių kalbos raidos ypatybes. Tyrimo uždaviniai: 1. Išanalizuoti psichologinę ir pedagoginę literatūrą apie aklųjų ir silpnaregių kalbinę raidą... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / SUMMARY The final master‘s study deals with the peculiarities in lingual development of the blind and poor-sighted children at preschool age (the comparative analysis). It is difficult to overestimate the role of the main analyzers, i.e. sight and hearing in the process of lingual development. The disorder of these analyzers affects very strongly the development of lingual activities and renders certain peculiarities to it. Very often the contents of concepts of a person, who is blind by nature, cardinally differ from that of people with normal sight. Lacking one technique for world cognition, the blind persons often inadequately use the concepts available. The sightless child can hear the language and learn it by imitation. Sometimes he is more motivated to use it than a seeing person, since it is the main channel for communication with others. Does really the lingual expression of the blind children differ from that of normally sighted? In this master’s study the attempts were done to answer this question. Problem of study. The lingual development of blind and poor-sighted preschoolers lacks normal psycho-physiological substantiation. These shortcomings should be compensated with help of the remaining healthy analyzers. But before it the differences in achieved lingual development between the children of this group and healthy ones should be find out. Object of study: lingual development in blind and poor-sighted children at preschool age (the comparative analysis). ... [to full text]

The Halifax Asylum for the Blind, the first residential school for blind children in Canada, opened its doors in 1872 as a charitable institution with educational goals. This work explores the foundation of the Asylum in light of Halifax’s religious, economic, and educational history in the mid-nineteenth century. It highlights the influence of local personalities and the fight for financial stability that led to a changed understanding of educating blind children and adults from that of charitable need to philanthropic right.

At a communications receiver the observed signal is a corrupted version of the transmitted signal. This distortion in the received signal is due to the physical characteristics of the channel, including multipath propagation, the non-idealities of copper wires and impulse noise. Equalization is a process to combat these distortions in order to recover the original transmitted signal. Roughly stated, the equalizer tries to implement the inverse transfer function of the channel while taking into account the channel noise. The equalizer parameters can be tuned to this inverse transfer function using an adaptive algorithm. In many cases, the algorithm uses a training sequence to drive the equalizer parameters to the optimum solution. But, for time-varying channels or multiuser channels the use of a training sequence is inefficient in terms of bandwidth, as bandwidth is wasted due to the periodic re-transmission of the training sequence. A blind equalization algorithm is a practical method to eliminate this training sequence. An equalizer adapted using a blind algorithm is a key component of a bandwidth efficient receiver for broadcast and point-to-multipoint communications. The initial convergence performance of a blind adaptive equalizer depends on the higher-order statistics of the transmitted signal. In modern digital systems, Tomlinson-Harashima precoding (THP) is often used for signal shaping and to mitigate the error propagation problem of a decision feedback equalizer (DFE). The concept of THP comes from pre-equalization. In fact, it is a nonlinear form of pre-equalization, which bounds the higher-order statistics of the transmitted signal. But, THP and blind equalization are often viewed as incompatible equalization techniques. In this research, we give multiple scenarios where blind equalization of a THP-encoded signal might arise. With this motivation we set out to answer the question, can a blind equalizer successfully acquire a THP-encoded signal? We investigate the combination of a Tomlinson-Harashima precoder on the transmitter side and a blind equalizer on the receiver side. By bounding the kurtosis of the THP-encoded signal, we show that THP actually aids the initial convergence of blind equalization. We find that, as the symbol constellation size increases, the THP-encoded signal kurtosis approaches that of a uniform distribution, not a Gaussian. We investigate the compatibility of blind equalization with THP-encoded signals for both SISO and MIMO systems. In a SISO system, conventional blind algorithms can be used to counter the distortions introduced in the received signal. However, in a MIMO system with multiple users, the other users act as interferers on the desired user's signal. Hence, modified blind algorithms need to be applied to mitigate these interferers. For both SISO and MIMO systems, we show that the THP encoder ensures that the signal distribution approaches a non-Gaussian distribution. Using Monte Carlo simulations, we study the effects of Tomlinson-Harashima precoding on the performance of Bussgang-type blind algorithms and verify our theoretical analysis. The major contributions of this thesis are: • A demonstration that a blind equalizer can successfully acquire a THP-encoded signal for both SISO and MIMO systems. We show that THP actually aids blind equalization, as it ensures that the transmitted signal is non-Gaussian. • An analytical quantification of the effects of THP on the transmitted signal statistics. We derive a novel bound on the kurtosis of the THP-encoded signal. • An extension of the results from a single-user SISO scenario to multiple users and a MIMO scenario. We demonstrate that our bound and simulated results hold for these more general cases. Through our work, we have opened the way for a novel application of training sequence-less equalization: to acquire and equalize THP-encoded signals. Using our proposed system, periodic training sequences for a broadcast or point-to-multipoint system can be avoided, improving the bandwidth efficiency of the transceiver. Future modem designs with THP encoding can make use of our advances for bandwidth efficient communication systems.

Restoring vision to the blind has been an objective of several research teams for a number of years. It is known that spots of light -- phosphenes -- can be elicited by way of electrical stimulation of surviving retinal neurons. Beyond this, however, our understanding of prosthetic vision remains rudimentary. To advance the realisation of a clinically viable prosthesis for the blind, a versatile integrated circuit neurostimulator was designed, manufactured, and verified. The neurostimulator provides electrical stimuli to surviving neurons in the visual pathway, affording blind patients some form of patterned vision; besides other benefits (independence), this limited vision would let patients distinguish between day and night (resetting their circadian rhythm). This thesis presents the development of the neurostimulator, an interdisciplinary work bridging engineering and medicine. Features of the neurostimulator include: high-voltage CMOS transistors in key circuits, to prevent voltage compliance issues due to an unknown or changing combined tissue and electrode/tissue interface impedance; simultaneous stimulation using current sources and sinks, with return electrodes configured to provide maximum charge containment at each stimulation site; stimuli delivered to a two dimensional mosaic of hexagonally packed electrodes, multiplexing current sources and sinks to allow each electrode in the whole mosaic to become a stimulation site; electrode shorting to remove excess charge accumulated during each stimulation phase. Detailed electrical testing and characterisation verified that the neurostimulator performed as specified, and comparable to, or better than, other vision prostheses neurostimulators. In addition, results from several animal experiments verified that the neurostimulator can elicit electrically evoked visual responses. The features of the neurostimulator enable research into how simultaneous electrical stimulation affects the visual neural pathways; those research results could impact other neural prosthetics research and devices.