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Re: ABBR vs. just spelling it out.

for

From: Kynn Bartlett
Date: Mar 30, 2006 12:50PM

On 3/29/06, Maren Child < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> I would imagine the acronyms and abbreviations would present the biggest
> hurdle to those with a cognitive disability.


Question: Do we know this is the case?

I ask simply because the point of MOST acronyms and abbreviations is
that you DON'T need to know what it stands for, you need to know what
it means.

E.g., knowing that WCAG stands for Web Content Accessibility
Guidelines created by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) doesn't tell
you as much as saying "WCAG is a set of guidelines for making your web
site more accessible." Knowing that radar stands for "radio detection
and ranging" doesn't help anyone (and in fact, if you saw "radio
detection and ranging" spelled out, most people wouldn't recognize it)
-- and if you had ambiguity between the normal definition of radar and
the folks at www.radar.org.uk, then likely you are dealing with poor
natural language writing to begin with. :)

--Kynn


--
Kynn Bartlett < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
Writer, Web Developer, Photographer, Game Designer
Tucson, Arizona
http://kynn.com