4.5 Guidance on digital accessibility
Digital accessibility is the deliberate design of digital products and technologies to make it easier and more convenient for people with disabilities to use them in everyday life. Digital accessibility is important in relation to Digital Rehabilitation to ensure that Digital Rehabilitation services are inclusive, effective and equal for all people, regardless of their abilities or disabilities.
It is guided by the following principles:
- Perceivability – Users should be able to easily process the content
- Operability – Users should have an easy time navigating the websites/digital products
- Robustness – The content must be accessible to individuals using a diverse mix of assistive technologies
- Understandable – The information should be clear and easy to comprehend
This is an essential pillar of rehabilitation as it ensures access to resources and facilities that are at the disposal of the rest of the population. For instance, individuals with visual impairments have trouble reading information presented on screens. In such cases, screen readers come in handy to ensure that they are not excluded from rehabilitation services provided on digital platforms. Similarly, accurate captions and transcripts for audio-visual information ensure access to information for people with hearing impairments. Additionally, a person with a tremor might not be able to operate a smartphone easily and therefore voice control might be beneficial.
Digital accessibility acknowledges that people living with disabilities use digital facilities as often as any other demographic. The primary objective of digital accessibility is operability. Digital content, services and technologies should be tailored to ensure that disability does not get in the way of their access. This can be achieved through;
- Consultation to understand accessibility shortfalls – Teams charged with digital accessibility must include people who understand the lived experiences of disability and the challenges associated with accessing digital resources.
- Getting familiar with accessibility guidelines – Digital accessibility design should align with existing web content guidelines such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines [17]. This ensures the design builds up on existing frameworks.
4.5.1. Universal design
All digital spaces must be built with universal design in mind.
“‘Universal design’ means designing or accommodating the main solution with respect to the physical conditions, including information and communications technology (ICT), such that the general functions of the undertaking can be used by as many people as possible, regardless of disability” [18].
Universal design is guided by the following principles:
- Equitable use – The design must be effective in use for everyone on the spectrum of ability.
- Flexibility in use – The design should accommodate the different preferences of the users [19]. For instance, a captioned audio-visual resource should have an option for the user to turn the captions on or off, increase the font size or change it.
- Simple and Intuitive Use – This means keeping the complexity of the design to a minimum [19]. It ensures that the user’s experience and knowledge or lack thereof does not impede their interactions with the digital resources.
- Perceptible information – The design should communicate all the important information to the user regardless of the ambient environment or sensory abilities.
- Tolerance for Error – People living with disability may struggle with the input of information or in the use of different technologies. The design should accommodate minor errors that are likely to occur without reducing the quality of their interactions with the systems.
- Low physical effort – Universal design should not be physically exacting or labor intensive to use.
- Appropriate Size and Space for Approach and Use – The design should allocate enough room for manipulation and use regardless of the user’s size or mobility [19].
These are the universal design options:
- Providing alternatives – This is an important yet often overlooked aspect of accessibility in digital and offline spaces. In the digital spaces, this means text equivalent for non-textual content and alternative input methods.
- Captions and transcripts – In line with the alternative means of access, multimedia content must be accompanied with captions and transcripts [17].
- Simplified design – Assistive technologies in the digital space are not adequately advanced [20]. Thus, the design of digital resources should allow for clear and straightforward navigation.
- Logical content structure – Digital content should be outlined in a logical and consistent format with headings and other accessibility-oriented design decisions for easier navigation for people using assistive technologies.
- Regular updates – With continued research comes improvements in digital accessibility. All digital resources should incorporate these improvements through regular updates.