Understanding physical disability when designing a website

People with a physical disability may have difficulty with controlling their hands and arms, as well as other aspects of movement.

There can be many causes of physical disability and the effects can vary too. Many would expect that the accommodation of physical disability would focus on making things bigger and easier to use for those people with poor fine motor control (making small movements and holding something still). Whilst this is often the case, there are many conditions which result in the individual having good fine motor control but not the control over large movements (or gross motor control) to hold and use a mouse effectively.

Others find prolonged use of their arms or hands tiring.

Fortunately, the approaches you take in ensuring your website is accessible are fundamentally the same for all of these groups.

Assistive technology

Users with a physical disability are more likely to struggle using the standard keyboard or mouse and may find it easier using ergonomic or specialised devices. Specialised keyboard and mouse designs are often referred to as assistive technology. Common technologies employed by physically disabled users are:

Keyboards with larger keys to aid with precision
Keyguards – a sheet of plastic or metal that fits across the top of the keyboard to help steady the hand, aid with stamina and increase accuracy
Trackballs/Joysticks – alternative pointing devices that stay in a static location on the desk and do not require to be held whilst operating
Switches – by pressing switches with any part of the body a user can make ‘choices’ on the screen; an example could be a copy of the keyboard on the screen where the user presses the switch to choose which letter they wish to type
Assistive software - a wide range of software is available from simple tuning of how quickly the keyboard and mouse respond (free options in every copy of Windows and MacOS), to voice recognition programs that provide a full interactive interface with the computer completely hands free.

What you can do

Physical disabilities are wide ranging and can cover users who are quadriplegic, with no use of limbs to users who are temporarily disabled with a broken wrist or tennis elbow.

Simple techniques incorporated into the development of websites can ensure the accessibility for users with mobility impairments:

Ensure that all functionality is available via the keyboard as well as the mouse

This can be checked by tabbing through links, forms and Flash movies via the keyboard and testing all functionality to ensure they can be accessed without the mouse. This not only assists users who cannot use a mouse through disability, but also for those users who do not have access to a pointing device - e.g. accessing your website from a PDA or WebTV set top box.

Similarly voice recognition software can replicate mouse movement but not as efficiently as it can replicate keyboard functionality. Ensuring all functionality is available from the keyboard means it is more likely to be compatible with voice input technologies.

Ensure that font size can be increased

This will enable users who have fine motor control difficulties to increase the font size enabling them to click more accurately on links.

Provide skip links

Provide a means to skip over navigation via a ‘skip navigation’ link and on long pages a ‘Back to Top’ link between sections. This enhances the accessibility for users accessing the website via the keyboard as they will be able to select one link to jump over the navigation into the main page content instead of laboriously tabbing through each link.

Make a big clickable area

Ensure that links and images are a decent size and not too close together. For example ensure that the graphical buttons such as the ‘Go’ button on a ‘Search Form’ is a good size enabling users who have poor motor control to be able to select the button more easily. Separate adjacent links by several pixels – not just one or two.

Avoid moving targets

Do not make anything you want your visitors to click on move or disappear before they have had the chance to locate it. Many visitors will not be able to click on a moving target. They may also not be physically able move their pointing device (mouse, head wand etc) to an offer before it is replaced by another advert.

How we can help

For more information on the different Assistive Technologies (AT) disabled users use to access the internet, or to have in-house training on Web site design and building for AT users, use the details below to get in contact with us. We can put together a training package for you that will address your individual needs.

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