2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Development of experimental safety management and education methods to support diversification of career choice for visually impaired persons

Research Project

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Project/Area Number	19K21747
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Research (Exploratory)
Allocation Type	Multi-year Fund
Review Section	Medium-sized Section 9:Education and related fields
Research Institution	The University of Tokyo
Principal Investigator	Oshima Yoshito 東京大学, 大学院新領域創成科学研究科, 教授 (70213709)
Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha)	辻佳子東京大学, 環境安全研究センター, 教授 (10436529) 澤口亜由美東北大学, 理学研究科, 技術一般職員 (10837785)
Project Period (FY)	2019-06-28 – 2024-03-31
Keywords	視覚障害 / 実験安全 / 行動解析 / 理系 / 進路選択 / 被験者実験 / 科学的手法
Outline of Final Research Achievements	As a part of efforts to diversify career options for visually impaired students, we took up experimental work, which is a potential hurdle for students to enter science-related schools. The main subjects of the study were: surveying the current situation and identifying issues related to experimental work through questionnaires to visually impaired students and discussions with faculty members who have experience teaching experiments to the visually impaired; scientific analysis of experimental behavior of the visually impaired through subject experiments simulating unit operations in chemistry experiments; and proposal of new technologies to support experiments by the visually impaired by utilizing machine learning and sound. The study provided basic knowledge that will contribute to the formulation of guidelines for the development of hardware, such as the improvement of tools and equipment, and software, such as support and guidance based on the type and degree of disability.
Free Research Field	実験室安全
Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements	実験研究には様々なリスクが存在しており、視覚に障害があることでそのリスクが増大する可能性はある。一方で、そもそも視覚障害者が実験を行うことは困難であるという固定観念的な前提が、障害者自身、受入教員側の双方に存在することも事実である。実際に、視覚障害の種類や程度、視覚以外の五感の活用などを考慮に入れ、リスクの具体的な低減策や合理的な代替手法について工夫する余地は十分にある。今後視覚障害学生の増加が予想されることに鑑み、本研究の成果は、視覚障害のある学生が安全に実験作業に携わるための留意点や、周囲に求められる合理的な配慮・支援のあり方について示唆を与える基礎的知見として大きな社会的意義を有する。