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Re: Design Principles for Cognitive Disabilities

for

From: Phil Teare
Date: Nov 8, 2006 2:40PM

>We don't have the collective experience.

Then I'll offer some.

I have a cognitive difference. I'm severly dyslexic. And for me that means I
cannot read or write quickly or accurately. Fluency is impossible for me
without a screen reader, and as such I skim and compensate in many ways.
Also hindered by short term memory deficits, I find dependancy on badly
labled bread crum navigation a problem (as I forget which stage I was at
when I did x).

These propblems culminated in the very real problem of me not being able to
fill my TAX return online. I was VERY happy to see it as an option as I
prefer reading from a screen. But the system would always timeout before I
could finish. This drove me crazy. And was a real problem for me as I make
more mistakes on paper, and they are harder to correct. If you make too many
the paper becomes a mess and they refuse to accept it. This is just one
example. I am one of more that 10% of the population similarly effected.
This is a much larger percentage than those with v.i.

So please don't ignore the issue because you don't know how to solve it. If
you're on the forum I'm guessing you do want to solve such issues. I'm
saying that there are design factors that you can consider practically which
will benift many in the real world, in real ways, without you needing to
take another degree course to get up to scratch.
e.g.
1) timeouts should be plenty long! not for you to finish it, but for someone
litteraly 7 times slower than you.
2) include icons. They don't have to be huge and childlike. But simple and
representive. Think XP iconic graphics.
3) Put youself in the position of someone with a short term memory problem,
a language proble, etc.... Just as you would a v.i. user.
4) Visit a forum dedicated to each major issue, listen to anechdotes of
those effected.
5) offer a variety of interfaces. People like choice, and some people will
need that 'other alternative'

An example of a tip for those with English (read: language of content in
question) as a second language, is offer graphical and audio content, and
lable the help options with the internation *i *for information.

You could fill books with this kind of thing... just as with v.i.
considerations. But you can also boil it down to X best tips for...

So please, don't give up before you start.

Best
Phil