Abstract: During daily activities, a walker interacts with their environment, especially the other walkers, avoiding any collision with them. The nature of visual information that is used for a collision-free interaction requires further understanding. Specifically, the thesis aims to answer the following questions: what are the visual cues an individual perceives from the movement of others? What are the possible interpretation mechanisms and models used for determining future predicted crossing distances? To answer these questions, we designed experiments considering collision avoidance interactions between two walkers in virtual reality, allowing detailed control of the visual environment and the available visual information. The first study of the thesis focused on the nature of visual information provided from another walker, investigating whether these visual cues are extracted from local body parts or from global perception of the body motion. The second study investigated the influence of the walker's path (straight or curved), which the participant is interacting with for the accurate estimation of future risk of collision. Finally, the third study investigated whether eye contact influences the interaction. Here we have demonstrated the coupling of perceived action-opportunities affordances from the nature of visual information and evidenced that walkers can detect future predicted collisions when another walker follows a path with constant acceleration.

Dr. Teel joined the School of Physical and Occupational Therapy as a Postdoctoral Fellow in September 2017 after graduating from the Pennsylvania State University with a Master’s Degree in August 2013 and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in May 2017 with her PhD.

Dr. Nathan C. Hall is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology, Director of the Achievement Motivation and Emotion Research Group (www.ame1.net), and VP Communications for the McGill Association of University Teachers (MAUT). Dr. Hall's research program as funded by Canadian, U.S., and German granting agencies examines how both students and educators in K-12 and post-secondary education internationally maintain their motivation, performance, and well-being in response to academic and personal challenges.

There is a tendency for healthcare curricula to draw from the arts and humanities when needing to direct students’ attention to the “whole persons” for whom they will care: evidence of the strength of the human spirit, for instance, or the diversity of human expression are but some of the qualities heralded of artistic works shown to future medical and rehabilitation professionals. While useful in terms of reminding students that patients’ identities extend well beyond their health conditions, such an approach only represents a small portion of what the arts and humanities can contribute to healthcare education: for instance, a more critical understanding of how the cultures of illness, health, and care are consolidated through diverse practices of linguistic, visual and media-based representation. Through pointed examples drawn from my research and practice at the intersection of arts and health over the past decade, my presentation will focus on further practical potentials for an arts- and humanities-based healthcare curriculum: the development of students’ clinical reasoning skills, their increased visual and media literacy, an amelioration in their communication and listening skills, and a better understanding of how professional as well as patient identities are historically and culturally constructed.

Although patient-centered approaches have contributed to significant advances in care and to treatments that more fully respect patients’ preferences, values, and personal experiences, the reality is that health care professionals still hold a monopoly on the role of healer.
Patients live with their conditions every day and are experts when it comes to their own experiences of illness; this expertise should be welcomed, valued, and fostered by other members of the care team.
The patient-as-partner approach embodies the ideal of making the patient a full member of the health care team, a true partner in his or her care.
The presentation will uncover this innovative approach to patient care, including the conceptual framework used in its development and the main achievements of patient partners in education, health care, and research.