WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: [EXTERNAL]Labelling a "fill in the blank" form field

for

From: Tim Harshbarger
Date: Apr 25, 2018 8:26AM

The easiest solution might be to provide instructions before the fill-in-the-blank questions to ensure the users are in the right frame of mind for interpreting the labels. Then you might be able to use a label such as "fill-in-the-blank" or "fill-in-the-blank for question 2". You could also try wrapping the whole question (along with the textbox) inside a label element.

When trying to figure out if a label or alt text description is adequate, it is a good rule of thumb to look at the context of the content. How someone interprets a label depends heavily on what frame of mind they are in and that is heavily influenced by the context of the content.

If the user knows that the textfields are all part of a sentence or paragraph because the questions are fill-in-the-blank your label doesn't necessarily need to convey as much.

If the user doesn't know what kind of questions will be asked, you probably need a label that provides a lot more detail.

Thanks,
Tim