Knowledge Visualization

Despite the benefits visualizations can bring to understanding and communicating relevant societal issues such as climate change, they are difficult to access for one in 24 people in Switzerland who live with a visual impairment.

Therefore, this project explores the potential of Virtual Reality (VR) for inclusive knowledge transfer through the participatory design of an interactive visualization that can be discovered and experienced through haptic feedback and spatial sound.

The VR experience was designed in an interdisciplinary team consisting of individuals from computer, learning, climate science and sound design, while involving the target group of blind and visually impaired people along the way through interviews, meetings and testings. This process led to the creation of an accessible, embodied, audio-haptic infographic about the global water cycle and its links to extreme weather events.

Based on these findings, the project derived design guidelines to support the future development of inclusive visualizations using VR technology. Ultimately, these experiences can support multi-sensory, body-based learning and provide a new approach to experiencing visualizations that can be beneficial to all learners.