The Power of Accessible Design
Designing accessible user experiences has been a core focus of Spring semester. Having worked in the government contracting industry for over eight years, I am no stranger to accessibility laws and 508 federal regulations. While in the past, I viewed these regulations as a nuisance and hindrance to my creativity, over the past semester, I have developed a new-found appreciation for accessible design.
What is Accessible Design
According to the University of Washington, accessible design is a “design process in which the needs of people with disabilities are specifically considered.” While people with disabilities is a key focus, accessible design addresses a continuum of permanent, temporary, and situational impairments. In regards to user experience design, accessibility means ensuring technology is usable and accessible to users despite hearing, movement, sight, and cognitive ability.
Why It Matters
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, about 56.7 million people in the United States have a disability. That’s nearly 20% of the population. In terms of market opportunity, why wouldn’t you want to increase your user base by 20%? In addition, there is a misconception that disabilities are permanent. Accessibility design applies to a wide spectrum of temporary and situational impairments that can increase your user base even more.
While there is a strong business case to support accessibility, accessible design also creates more meaningful and impactful experiences for a wider range of users.
How to Incorporate Accessibility into UX
Accessibility should be considered from the beginning of the UX design process. “A Web for Everyone,” written by Sarah Horton and Whitney Quesenbery, includes nine principles for incorporating accessibility.
- People First: Known your audience and consider users with disabilities who are appropriate for your product.
- Clear Purpose: A clear purpose and well-defined goals support accessibility. Think “accessibility first” so it is built in from the beginning.
- Solid Structure: Create a solid structure, including coding to standards and using stylesheets to separate content and presentation to support machine-readable data.
- Easy Interaction: Design for easy interaction. Leverage HTML, WAI-ARIA, and features of the technology platform to identify and describe interactive elements.
- Helpful Wayfinding: Design helpful wayfinding and create consistent cues that support both visual navigation and assistive technologies.
- Clean Presentation: Design a clean presentation that allows users to adjust the display, including enlarging text and changing color settings.
- Plain Language: Use plain language and ensure information is easy to understand to support users with cognitive disabilities and non-native readers.
- Accessible Media: Make media, including images, audio, video, animations, and presentations accessible to users.
- Universal Usability: Design for universal usability by including people with disabilities in user research and usability testing.
Resources
While designing accessible user experiences can be overwhelming, there are a multitude of resources available to help, including the following:
