Monarch is Making a Difference: Comparative Study Explores Statistics and Scatter Plots

Designed for both students and adults, Monarch is equipped with tools that foster independent workers, make learning simpler, and daily living more accessible. APH is always supportive of research that allows us to better understand the effectiveness of Monarch and gives us insight into how we can improve upon it.

Recently, we were excited to learn that Monarch was part of a comparative study of three accessible data exploration systems ─ Olli (a text generator for screen reader access), TactualPlot (an audio-tactile tablet-based system), and the Monarch itself (a refreshable braille computer).

In the University of Maryland study which was published in ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing Journal article, “Sound, Touch, or the Full Monty? A Comparative Study of Accessible Data Exploration Systems for Blind Users”, ten blind participants completed data analysis tasks across bar charts, pie charts, line charts, and scatter plots. The goal: exploring how to make data visualizations more accessible to people who are blind or low vision. The result? While all three systems were comparable regarding visualization task accuracy, one thing stood out: participants were by far the fastest on Monarch.

One of the study collaborators was Yasmin Reyazuddin, a blind individual and graduate from the University of Maryland. Reyazuddin was the first to suggest that Monarch be used as part of the study for data visualization ─ attributing her love for math, which paved the way for her love of statistics, to APH’s metal slate.

Having first been introduced to Monarch at a convention in Houston in 2023, Reyazuddin instantly recognized that Monarch was useful for showing the shape and design of different tables, pie charts, and line graphs that were being looked at. “Monarch was much faster [in general],” Reyazuddin said. “There was a clear difference at the speed in which participants were able to complete tasks.” When asked what her favorite feature of Monarch was, she said, “The whole of it. The best thing is that I can read more than one line at a time, increasing speed – but also, I can do statistics on Monarch.”

A researcher involved in the study, Pramod Chundury, is the lead author and a data scientist with a Ph.D. in information science and a background in accessibility and data visualization. He says his passion for accessibility came about during his master’s program when he first worked on smart watches for people with upper body motor impairments.

The value of Monarch really shone through to Chundury when they were conducting a design session in which they asked a blind individual to create charts. “People have different ways of creating charts and this individual was able to create charts on his computer using standard visualization libraries,” said Chundury. “Having access to a refreshable system like Monarch while you’re creating charts ─ the fact that you could iterate ─ made all the difference,” said Chundury, referencing how quickly the digital pins refreshed.

Chundury also expressed his appreciation for the Monarch’s computing capabilities when customizing documents, like adjusting margins. Some of his favorite features on Monarch are the touch keys and the HDMI port which supports the visual display. He recalled how, while working with a participant who was trying to create charts, he couldn’t visually discern what was on the screen at first, but with the HDMI port, he was able to connect his monitor to the Monarch and actually run the session.

A research engineer at the College of Information (INFO), University of Maryland, J. Bern Jordan has been a part of the technology and accessibility field for over 20 years. Having started in web accessibility, he says being involved in this project as a researcher was a way of contributing to something that wasn’t his main line of work.

Monarch is “exciting technology,” Jordan said. With single-line refreshable braille displays being the “norm” for such a long time, Monarch has opened up a lot of computing for braille readers. “Monarch doesn’t just open up braille literacy – it opens up numeracy and tactile graphics, and connection to that in a way that’s much more dynamic than having somebody create a swell paper diagram for you every once in a while,” Jordan said. “Now you have the educational material, quite literally at your fingertips.”

The Monarch continues to break down barriers and open fields for more blind or low vision students. To learn more about Monarch, visit our Meet Monarch page. To read more stories like this one, visit some of our blogs linked below!

• Monarch is Making a Difference: Hannah DeFelice’s Story
• One Year Later: Celebrating and Reflecting on the Monarch
• Monarch is Making a Difference: Alexander Liddell’s Story