Introduction
In the UK, 1 in 5 people have a disability. This could be sight, hearing, mobility or cognitive (affecting memory and thinking). The WCAG standard was designed to meet the needs of users with these needs. This article looks at those permanent disabilities more closely. However, to truly design for everyone, we also need to consider temporary or situational disabilities which might be caused by:
| Permanent | Temporary | Situational | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Touch | One arm | Arm injury | New parent |
| See | Blind | Cataract | Distracted driver |
| Hear | Deaf | Ear infection | Bartender |
| Speak | Non-verbal | Laryngitis | Heavy accent |
Deaf and hard of hearing
Correct terminology:
“Deaf if identifies as being culturally deaf, or deaf if not, user of British Sign Language (BSL), person who is hard of hearing (hearing impaired is not a preferred term).
Design priorities:
- Embrace writing in plain English – English will be a second language for many BSL speakers.
- Provide captions and BSL interpretations – captions include all spoken content and important sound effects found in the original soundtrack.
- Do user research and testing with people who are deaf and hard of hearing.
Further reading:
Blind and low vision
Correct terminology
People with visual impairments, blind people, blind and partially sighted people, people with low vision.
Design priorities:
- Do user research and testing with people who use screen readers and screen magnifiers.
- Use good colour contrasts and font size
- Use alt text for images that describes the image’s content or conveys the same information (unless it’s decorative).
- Write headings that help users find what they’re looking for quickly.
- Write descriptive links and page titles that offer context
- Follow best practice for accessible form design – for example, make sure fields are labelled and can be read by screen readers
Further reading:
Physical and mobility difficulties
Correct terminology
Person with (name of condition or impairment), wheelchair user
Design priorities:
- Test with keyboard users and speech recognition software, looking particularly for things like focus order and keyboard traps.
- Session time outs – allow enough time and let users save what they’re doing or extend the time limit.
- Forms – include features that make it easy for users to complete forms, for example, have an ‘address lookup’ so users only need to enter their postcode and house number.
- Page layouts – give clickable areas plenty of space.
Further reading:
Cognitive (memory and learning)
Correct terminology
Person with (name of condition or impairment), person with a mental health condition/ learning difficulty
Design priorities:
- Test with people with a wide range of cognitive disabilities like severe Dyslexia, Asperger’s Syndrome, anxiety disorders, and depression.
- Colour and colour contrast – avoid bright colours or garish combinations.
- Session timeouts – make sure time outs on forms are reasonable
- Plain English and section headings – improve readability and reduce cognitive load for everyone, especially those with learning difficulties by writing simply, concisely, breaking up content into sections and lists where possible and placing the key information at the top
- Provide captions for video
- Forms – allow users to review answers before submission
- Page layouts – simple and consistent
- Fonts – avoid sporadic bold font styling and don’t use italics
Thank you for your feedback