Using Smart Glasses for the Inclusion of Hearing-Impaired Warehouse Workers into Their Working Environment

Handicapped people have limited access to the job market. The research reported in this paper aims to remedy this deficiency for the target group of hearing-impaired workers in warehouses. We investigate the suitability of a technology called Pick-by-Vision to advance the inclusion of people with hearing disabilities. This technology visually assists an order picker at gathering relevant information to execute his working tasks through the usage of smart glasses, also known as data glasses or head-mounted displays. Apart from the goal of inclusion in working-specific processes, communication barriers between the hearing-impaired and their hearing coworkers should also be reduced to approach an inclusion in the whole working environment. The ongoing research project is application-oriented and therefore accompanied by industrial partners. One of these partners operates a warehouse and already employs several handicapped people that contribute to the research in stages of requirements analysis, system design and evaluation.