TECHNOLOGIE VR W NAUCZANIU PROJEKTOWANIA UNIWERSALNEGO
2023, Przestrzeń Ekonomia Społeczeństwo
Thinking about people with disabilities among people professionally involved in architectural design has been noticeable for a long time. One cannot, however, resist the sad conclusion that these actions are very often formal rather than factual; most of these activities are in the nature of creating a substitute for efficiency by generating improvements in the built environment, and not strictly eliminating the barriers themselves. Such activities, although they improve the functioning of people with disabilities, also cause their stigmatization, which is also pointed out by many researchers . Considering the dynamic progress of medicine resulting in a significant increase in life expectancy, and due to the availability of a tool for effective activation of the elderly and people with disabilities, there is a clear need for urgent changes in urban space, which would result in treating disability more broadly and comprehensively than before. Disability is not only dysfunctions and their minimization (or, worse, marginalization), it is rather a philosophy of equality in diversity, while universal design is one of the basic tools for implementing this doctrine. This article is a description of an experiment conducted with the use of virtual reality simulators, the effect of which was to obtain new possibilities of perceiving space as it is perceived by people with various dysfunctions – with the use of senses that have not been so obvious and commonly used in design practice so far. The experiment was conducted during the academic year 2022/2023 on a group of first-semester students (about 30 people) of the fields of Architecture and Landscape Architecture of the Sopot Academy of Applied Sciences. According to the authors, it was a successful attempt to broaden the horizon of space interpretation and also perception as an area accessible not only to fully able people. The experiment conducted with the use of disability simulation in VR technology allowed the participants of the experiment to understand the specificity of individual dysfunctions and verify the correctness and legitimacy of the solutions used in the barrier maps. The integrated use of sensory and motor disability simulators made the participants realize that only comprehensive and complementary solutions mitigating barriers in built-up space will be an effective tool to stimulate inclusive activities.
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