Shared Autonomy for Wheel Chair Control: Attempts to Assess the User's Autonomy

People who suffer from paresis, tremor, spasticity etc. may experience considerable difficulties when driving electric wheel chairs. A sensor-based wheel chair may assist these users in their daily driving manoeuvres. There are two extreme cases: on the one hand, the wheel chair can be fully in control and on the other, the user can be fully in control. It is however difficult to determine a suitable level of shared autonomy situated in between these two extreme cases. This paper presents a framework for shared autonomy and addresses the issue of assessing the user’s autonomy.