Today, Anna chats with Emma Smith, PhD., about some of our favourite things: assistive technology, policies, and interdependence.
We discuss:
To learn more about Emma and her research and projects, check out: https://emmamariasmith.ca/
Today, Anna chats with Emma Smith, PhD., about some of our favourite things: assistive technology, policies, and interdependence.
We discuss:
To learn more about Emma and her research and projects, check out: https://emmamariasmith.ca/
Welcome to the'Do what you love' podcast. We believe that doing and belonging contribute to wellbeing. And through this podcast, we will explore how to share strategies for doing exactly that what you love. Although some members are health and wellbeing professionals. This podcast provides wellness management in an informational manner. Only under no circumstances. Should this podcast substitute for a call or visit with a healthcare professional that is, or can become familiar with your lived experience.
Anna:Hi, everyone! It's Anna here, on the'Do what you love' podcast today. I am pleased to welcome Emma Smith, an occupational therapist who does lots of work in the area of assistive technology and looks at global perspectives. And she is here to chat with us about the use of assistive technology in everyday life. Welcome Emma, please, can you introduce yourself and let us know,in accordance with our podcast, what one of your favorite occupations is and what it brings to your life.
Emma:Absolutely. So thanks so much, Anna, for having me. I'm really excited to be here. so as Anna mentioned, my name is Emma Smith and I'm an occupational therapist and my work is primarily in the area of policies and systems for access to assistive technology. And one of the things that I really love to do is to go hiking and spend time outdoors. It's my opportunity to have some space just to think, and to filter and process what's happened during the day or during the week, and really have an opportunity to answer some of those bigger questions in my head that maybe don't get answered on a day to day basis when everything's so busy.
Anna:Totally. That's one of the reasons I love hiking and walking too. It's like a nice processing time.
Emma:Exactly.
Anna:Yeah. So why did you become an occupational therapist and what are you up to now?
Emma:Yeah. So, um, I actually did my undergraduate degree in international development and fully intended on going that route. And then, really, as I got to the end of my degree, thought that I didn't have a skill that I could offer in an international context. And didn't feel like I could reasonably just. Work internationally without offering something in terms of a skillset. And I had worked previously in a kids camp for kids with fairly severe disabilities, and I had really enjoyed it. I also had a cousin who was an OT, which meant that I actually knew what OT was Bagley. Um, and so I decided to apply to the OT program and very much with the idea that I would end up working in adolescent child and adolescent mental health, um, because it was an area of passion. Then, as things do they change and you end up going different paths and ended up in places you don't anticipate. And certainly as an OT student, I, um, if you'd asked me what I didn't want to do, I would have told you anything to do with wheelchairs and anything to do with older adults. And I ended up falling in love with assistive technology, falling in love with wheelchairs, through the course of various jobs that I had. At the end of the day, I ended up working a lot with seniors and wheelchairs together, which is what I ended up doing all of my work in my PhD. And so obviously that didn't go as planned. And then, um, now I actually work, yeah, I live in Ireland and I work at Maynooth University as a researcher looking at assistive technology, the policies and systems that we have to access assistive technology and work with a large global initiative, or two large global initiatives, called The Global Cooperation on Assistive Technology out of the World Health Organization and Assistive Technology 2030, which is run out of the global disability innovation hub in London. So I get to work with a lot of absolutely incredible people and really look at the big picture of how we advance access to assistive technology on a global scale.
Anna:When we were getting ready for the interview today, you brought up the concept of assistive technology being something we all use to promote our own sense of health and wellbeing, as interdependent people, rather than as independent people. Tell me more about this.
Emma:Well, so I've been, and this is something I've been thinking about for a really long time. I think, um, it really started with my thoughts around the idea of assistive technology not necessarily being technology for disability, but being technology that anybody could use. So. This idea that all technology in some way or another is assistive technology. So if I use my phone to have my calendar and that's what allows me to remember that I have, um, appointments during the day or gives me reminders- that's assisting me and that's assistive technology. If I use my Apple watch, that's assistive,technology. If I use even a paper calendar, I consider that assistive technology and that's not dependent on me being a person who's been labeled as a person with a disability or identifying as a person who has a disability, that's just me, as a person. And I really think that it's important that we can maybe get away from this concept of:"assistive technology as being only for people who have a disability", and really that it's something we all use. And so from that thought process, I really started to think about what that meant in terms of this concept of independence that we always talk about. We always want our clients to be more independent, to gain independence, to regain independence. But I started to wonder if maybe we were placing way too much focus on that issue or that concept of independence. And if maybe that was hindering our ability to really have people use assistive technology to its greatest extent. So the idea that we're actually all dependent in some way, whether it's on others or whether it's on technology. And that allows us to do the things we need and want to do in our lives. And it's not that we're not doing them on our own, but we are using the tools around us. And so I started thinking a lot more about the concept of interdependence, the idea that we're not necessarily, individually, doing everything 100% ourselves. We're using those tools. We're using those people in our environments and that that's good. Like the interdependence is actually a desirable state. And maybe if we could think more about interdependence as the goal for all of us, that it would reduce some of that stigma attached to using assistive technology, because all of a sudden it's normal that you're dependent on some form of technology. It's normal that I am as Emma. It's normal that you are as Anna, that. We are all dependent on these things and we're dependent on each other. And that's a good thing. The fact that we're dependent on our communities for many things on our families, on the people around us that should never be viewed as a negative. And I think this high, high focus on independence, above all else, sometimes constrains our ability to talk about the benefits of technology or the benefits of assistance for everybody, regardless of whether you have a disability or not.
Anna:And it's funny that you bring up the example of calendars because that's something I always tell my clients when, um, I'm introducing some strategies. I work with lots of people post-concussion. And we, so we use calendars quite frequently as a strategy to help them with managing their schedule. And I always say, I literally couldn't function without my calendar. Like I need my calendar. Yeah. I always put it like a point. I'm like, okay, we're at the session. We're scheduling, I'm putting it in my calendar. Let's put it in your calendar too to kind of like normalize it and make it something that's like part of our everyday life for sure.
Emma:Yeah it's certainly not something that I think should be, um, should be seen as problematic. I mean, just think about all the ways that we rely on technology, especially these days. I mean, it's so ubiquitous, it's such a part of our, our day-to-day life that I don't know that I know a single person who isn't dependent, in some form, on the technology that they use every day.
Anna:Yeah. And I think it's also like the convenience factor as well with like Alexa and, um, our like at-home devices being like, Alexa, turn off the TV. Like, that's something that is convenient for people, but it's also something that is needed for people. So it's like making again, um, those technologies more accessible and more cost-effective.
Emma:And I think this brings up an interesting concept, this idea of mainstream technologies versus disability technologies. Um, The reality is so much is going into the mainstream now that, and that's great. I mean, it's great in so many levels, it means that the costs are coming down. It's becoming less stigmatized. It's it's, it's just much more'normal'. I mean, you look at an iPhone/an iPad that has accessibility features built in whether you need them or not. And so when you do need them, they're there and you don't need to go and seek something else. And, um, that changes the conversation around the technology. And it also means that a person who like if you just need that extra little bit of input to say, have the flashing light to tell you when your phone's ringing, even though you don't have a hearing impairment, but that's useful to you in some way, that's an accessibility feature that's built in. And that's a great feature. It's a great feature for lots of people who don't necessarily have a"hearing impairment". Right? And so the more that these technologies are in the mainstream, the more accessible they are. And that's really wonderful. I mean, it brings up other issues. It brings up issues around insurance and how we how we pay for things. Lots of insurance companies aren't willing to pay for something that's seen as typical or normal or mainstream. If it's not cleared by a medical device company or in the United States, it was not cleared by the FDA, is it insurable? I mean, there's lots of questions there, but I think there's things we should be grappling with because the more things are in the mainstream, the better it is for everyone.
Anna:Totally. I think this concept relates a lot to like occupational justice, which is what we talk about in occupational science world. What are your thoughts on that?
Emma:Well, and I think this is... um... I see technology as an enabler, in a major way. And I think for me, it's an enabler of many things. It's an enabler of independence or interdependence, however, somebody wants to look at that. It's an enabler of choice. And to me, occupational justice is so rooted in choice. Um, I think it's, it's an enabler rights and to me rights are, um, I mean, I work in a very rights focused environment and, and I think the more that we're able to give people access to those rights that they should and could be afforded. And certainly by most governments in the world have been guaranteed, um, to have those technologies and to give people access to those rights is really important. So I think the technology meets all of these criteria for me in terms of access to rights, access to justice, access to choice. And that, to me, all feeds into the concept of occupational justice.
Anna:I'm also hearing, um, in talking about the concept of interdependence is kind of looking at the concept of community and belonging as well. Um, could you expand on that further?
Emma:Yeah, absolutely. So I, and I think this is, um, this is something that we see a lot of in sort of Western culture and North America is, and in Europe too, but I think more so in North America, we've got this huge focus on'by myself'. You know, this concept of like'aloneness', this'independence' concept that I think has stripped away some of the aspects of the importance of community and how community contributes to wellbeing. And. Well, there are lots of other examples of cultures in other parts of the world where community's a much higher focus, people live with their families for longer, or even for life. And, and you have that support and that's different, you know, and it's different from this very North American focus of'by yourself'. when we're thinking about interdependence, we're really thinking about how we use not only our technologies, but how we use our communities, to the best effect and how those communities can be supportive of our wellbeing and supportive of our interdependence without necessarily needing to be overbearing in any way. Or I think there's this fear of like,'if my community is surrounding me all the time, it's somehow going to change my life in a negative way.' But the reality is most lives over the course of human history have been in collectivist, more collectivist societies. They've relied more on the people around them. And I think that's a good thing. And so I think we've maybe strayed from that and we have an opportunity to say"Why?" Right? Like why, why aren't we looking more at the role of community and how we can be supported by the people around us?
Anna:Totally. That's something that for me, my personal experience, um, like, I went to Austria and to a mountain village, there the sense of community is really strong. So I made lots of friends with people who are my parents' age they really helped out. And like, I could always like, Oh, like open door, could come in to be like,'Oh, can we chat' or'I need help getting to the grocery store'. Like I learned how to drive manual from some of them. And it was all these skills that like I didn't have, and I needed support from community to build Um,
Emma:And I mean could you imagine if we expected everybody to have every skill they would ever need in life?
Anna:I know!
Emma:Like it's a completely unrealistic expectation, but I think sometimes. We get in this mindset of,'I need to be able to do all of that.' Like, I would never do my own electrical work in my house. I would hire an electrician. I would never do my own plumbing because that's not my skillset and it doesn't need to be my skillset. Um, it doesn't even need to be the skillset within my immediate family. If I have a community that I, that can support me.
Anna:Totally. What do you think we can do as occupational therapists and scientists to empower this idea for the future and promote an inclusive society through innovations in assistive technology or assistive technology services?
Emma:So I think we have a couple of opportunities and one of them is that we have a real opportunity as advocates to contribute to this development of technology within the mainstream. So when we're asked to give advice and to talk about all of the potential options for what a technology could be, that it's our responsibility to speak up and to say, you know, there's an opportunity to make this a more inclusive technology to make this a more accessible technology. Um, and I think that's our responsibility as. As occupational therapists, certainly it's within our role, but also to advocate for our direct clients. So if a client is interested in using a piece of technology that maybe isn't where they need it to be, to be able to find the ways to do that. So I think we definitely have a role there. And then I think on the science side, we have a role to play in terms of talking about it, right? On the occupational science side, in other areas of science to talk about it from a policies perspective, um, there, we have an opportunity to do research in the area and to really elevate the conversation around a) what's important and b) how we best support each other and support our clients and support our communities to be more inclusive and to be more engaged in terms of making sure everybody succeeds. And like I said, it's not just about people with disabilities. It's about everybody. And, and that's important because I think if everybody's succeeding the community succeeds more generally.
Anna:Something else that I'm just reminded of as we talk about community, um, is at ISS this year, we've talked about community mobility and ways that assistive technology can improve community mobility. What are your thoughts on this? Like with travel and within our individual communities?
Emma:Yeah. I mean, so we know that we have issues around community mobility when it comes just to accessibility alone for people getting around our communities. Um, we're pretty bad at making sure that people have access to their environments. But I think at the end of the day, it's about design when it comes down to it. And we have opportunities to design spaces in ways that are much more accessible and they're accessible across the board. It, and I I've often heard people talk about, say a wheelchair versus a person with a stroller. And there was some interesting research that came out recently looking at how cities are used and how spaces are used and how people are using things like wider sideways and bike paths and, and what different people's, um, what their commutes look like and, and how that changes over time and how it changes in cities. And I think that the example was really, it was really poignant to me. They were talking about the differences between generally how men use cities and how women use cities. And when you had a more accessible city that was more accessible to people with disabilities, because it had wider bike paths or sorry, wider sidewalks, wider, or better access to those sidewalks. Um, more services available and more centralized or less centralized locations, more distributed throughout the city, more neighborhood oriented it was better for all those women, in addition to all those people with disabilities. And because they were the primary caregivers who were out with strollers on the street. Right? So it changes it. There are secondary consequences and it changes it for the whole community. And that's really important. So I think it's about community planning in the sense that we look at a community and we say,"How do we make sure that this community best serves all of its residents, all of its residents, including those people who have mobility disabilities, including those people who need to carry their groceries in a cart, including those people who use a cane, including those people who push the stroller? How do we make sure that our city or our space is accessible to all of them and not only accessible, but is used by all of them to the best of their ability?" Right? So I think there's a huge role around community. And, and, but then I also think there's something about awareness. I mean, you watch, signage get put out on the street and all of a sudden it narrows the sidewalk, and nobody who's in a wheelchair can get past because the signage is in the way. And that's about awareness. And I think sometimes it's just, people don't think about the placement of things because it's not their experience. So the more that people are visible within their communities, because they actually can be. Um, and the more that people have an awareness of the needs of others in their community and that those conversations happen the better. Right? I think it raises everybody's level of awareness. And then you end up with better community you end up with better use of your spaces.
Anna:Yeah, like building bridges and like kind of sharing that knowledge together can really improve our accessibility as a whole for everyone in their preparation for all of everyone. Thank you for your time today, Emma, what is one last golden nugget that you would like to share about either assistive technology, participation, health or wellbeing?
Emma:Yeah, I think, um, for me, it's the, the idea that assistive technology needs to be brought out of the health space and the disability space. That assistive technology is about wellness and it's about wellness and inclusion for everybody. And that the more that we look at it as, as technologies to promote wellness and technologies to promote inclusion, I think everyone benefits and it changes our conversation and it changes the stigma. Um, so for me, I really do think that it's about bringing assistive technology out of the health world and into the wellness space and really understanding it as something which promotes our wellbeing.
Anna:Well, thank you so much for your time today. Emma.
Emma:Thanks. Anna
Amelia:Music for the, Do What You Love podcast was provided by purple planet on royalty free download service.