Development and User Evaluation for a Robust Character Input Support System for Natural Images of Electricity Reading Slips

Abstract

Text input, which is essential for a variety of applications, is one of the most difficult operations for older people. So, we propose a prototype to automatically detect and input text from a natural image taken from a user's smartphone. For the evaluation of the system, 232 photo data taken by the actual people were prepared. When all data was processed on the server, the average processing time was less than 10 seconds, and the overall recognition rate was over 94%. For user study, 20 healthy elderly people aged 65 years or older were collected. And, after conducting a simulation with the conventional typing system, the prototype in this proposal was asked to be used. The time required to complete each work was recorded, and the usability was evaluated using System Usability Scale (SUS).

As a result, both the healthy older group and the MCI older group tended to shorten the task execution times and increase their SUS scores by using our application, compared to the conventional method. Also, comparing the SUS score with other Web applications, it is considered that usability is high as a prototype.