Accessibility+and+Cognitive+Disabilities

by Karen Scudder

Great accomplishments have occurred in the area of web accessibility for the disabled, however, according to Hudson, consideration for cognitive disabilities is often overlooked (Hudson, 2005). Cognitive disabilities, by far the largest disability group, are categorized into six functions: memory, problem-solving, attention, reading, linguistic, and verbal comprehension, math comprehension and visual comprehension (Center for Persons with Disabilities, 1999-2011). Many basic modifications of web content and recommended checkpoints for web sites may also be beneficial to those with cognitive disabilities yet the W3C guidelines set higher priorities for visual impairment than for cognitive considerations (Roger Hudson, 2005).

One reason for this oversight is that cognitive disabilities include a broad range of issues. It would be difficult to consider every learning difficulty because each person is unique in their abilities. Very little is known about some of these disabilities and many individuals have difficulty with more than one of the cognitive functions Another challenge for web designers is that a “solution for one user is a hindrance to another, for example images could potentially be a distraction to someone who prefers text” (Pouncey, 2011).

Internet accessibility for the disabled in some ways is a matter of best practices for web design but certain guidelines will help to include a larger number of people. The first consideration is consistency in navigation, fonts and font sizes, and interactive elements. Consistency allows users to know what to expect from the web site. The structure should be well organized; the headings and subheadings need to be concise and clear. Users who have difficulty focusing may find contrasting colors, unexpected sounds, or pop ups distracting. The web site should have good readability and wherever possible the content should be in multiple formats, yet non-distracting (i.e. video, images, and text) (Pouncey, 2011). Content should be made available for a variety of applications or feeds.

“The best strategy for creating a site accessible to those with cognitive or learning difficulties is to provide clear and straight forward content in an easy to use interface with few distractions” (Pouncey, 2011).

__**Sources**__

Center for Persons with Disabilities. (1999-2011). //Cognitive Disabilities.// Retrieved August 7, 2011, from WebAIM:Web accessibility in mind: @http://webaim.org/articles/cognitive/

Pouncey, I. (2011). //Web accessibility for cognitive disabilities and learning difficulties.// Retrieved August 8, 2011, from Dev.Opera: Follw the standards, break the rules: @http://dev.opera.com/articles/view/cognitive-disability-learning-difficulty/

Hudson, R (2005, January 30). //An Accessibility Frontier: Cognitive disabilities and learning difficulties.// Retrieved August 7, 2011, from Webusability: accessibility and usability services: @http://www.usability.com.au/resources/cognitive.cfm