Humanise accessibility
Can everyone with different abilities access, understand and navigate all web content?
Why it’s important
- Jim has tendonitis and is unable to use a mouse; instead, Jim uses the keyboard to navigate the web.
- Tui has low vision and uses a screen reader to navigate the web.
- Gia is dealing with a crisis and needs to quickly find the right advice.
Next steps
- Cover accessibility and inclusive design issues when conducting user research.
- Consider native language, literacy(this link opens an external website), digital literacy, and digital access of your users. Also review potential visual, hearing, motor, and cognitive disabilities.
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Learn the experience of using your product with assistive technology. Be aware the way a person with a disability uses assistive tools may differ from your own experience. This may include:
- Turning off your mouse and track-pad, navigate the product using your keyboard only.
- Adding the free mozilla(this link opens an external website) vision simulator NoCoffee. Under Color deficiency select Achromatopsia, explore your site to simulate color blindness.
- Find an appropriate empathy prompt(this link opens an external website) and walk your team through it.
- Turning off monitors and trying to use your online service with a screen reader, i.e. NVDA(this link opens an external website) Screen Reader.
- Include users with disability when undertaking user testing. Allow them to use their own assistive technology and equipment as they may have their own settings in place.
References
Resources
- Accessibility in UX: The case for radical empathy(this link opens an external website)
- Personas for Accessible UX(this link opens an external website)
- Understanding disabilities and impairments: user profiles(this link opens an external website)
- Accessibility and Me: A series of interviews with people with access needs.(this link opens an external website)