Week 3 was a unique experience for me as I was working on site only for the first half of the week. I worked on revising our literature review draft and preparing for the presentation of our research question and literature review. After completing these requirements, I left for the XR Access Symposium in New York City. This year’s focus was on “Insights from XR Assistive Technology: How can we learn from technologies aimed at assisting disabled people in order to make mainstream XR more accessible?”

I got the opportunity to learn about recent developments in XR accessibility through the speaker series, poster sessions and the discussions in breakout rooms. My favorite part of the conference was participating in a breakout discussion room called “Cognitive Overload” where we discussed ways to control sensory overload while using a complex interface such as XR. This also reminded us to accomodate the individual/user’s capacity to process information effectively and prioritize the user experience, especially people with disabilities. This provided me with a new lens to think about product design and made me realize the importance of holding such conversations.I was also able to assist my research team’s project ASL Champ! with our VR game demo. I got the opportunity to interact with so many people who have deeply contributed to the realm of Accessibility in XR.

Overall, this was an exciting and eventful opportunity and I realized that my research experience at Gallaudet University is pushing me to learn everday!