The Office for National Statistics
What is Accessibility?
Disability is when someone faces a barrier that prevents them from participating fully due to their medical condition, such as a steep flight of stairs or an inaccessible web form.
As designers we are often responsible for creating these barriers & disabilities, but that means that we also have the power to remove or avoid them - this is accessibility.
To do this we must first have an understanding of the different needs of all of our audience.
There are four types of disability that affect our audience's web access:
Ability to see, or process visual information.
Medical conditions include colour blindness, myopia and glaucoma.
Ability to operate a mouse or keyboard accurately or quickly, possibly using assistive technology instead.
Medical conditions include dyspraxia, RSI and cerebral palsy.
Ability to hear, or process acoustic information.
Medical conditions include prebyscusis, acoustic trauma, and auditory processing disorder.
Ability in mentally demanding areas such as reading, memory, attention, or complex concepts or language.
Medical conditions include Down's syndrome, apsergers and dyslexia.