Summary of “Towards Mobile Accessibility for Older People: A User Centered Evaluation”HCC 741 ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY AND ACCESSIBILITY

FALL 2014

HYE-KYUNG BAE

Trends of Older Adults Population

- In Europe (2012): 17.8% (65 years or older), 4.9% (80 years old or over)

- In the U.S. (2012): 43.1 million, 13.7% (65 years or older)

- In the world (as of November 20, 2014):

Total: 7,272 million

Ages 65+: 591.7 million, 8%

Trends of Older Adults Use of mobile devices

- to keep in touch with their families

- to get help for daily bases by using simple applications

(e.g. Medical Assistance apps, smart houses, etc.)

However, a substantial number of older adults do not get benefits of this technology

- devices with the mobile context and technologies evolve fast

- accessibility for a simple task is not easy

Background• The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)

- The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)

- The User Agent Accessibility Guidelines in the mobile context

• Guidelines from mobile operating system providers, such as Google, Microsoft, or Apple

- Guidance to develop accessible application for their operating systems

- Mobile devices have not been designed for older people

- Mobile apps have not been created for older users

Checklist of Mobile Accessibility Guidelines for Older People• A set of criteria collected from different sources focusing on older people

- Accessibility standards and guidelines established by W3C

- Literatures

- Accessibility best practices recommended by Apple and Google application developers

• Checklist based on barriers common to mobile devices

Checklist of Mobile Accessibility Guidelines for Older People

Evaluation of Three Different Apps• Big Launcher

• Fontrillo

• Mobile Accessibility for Andriod (MAA)

Experimental Design• Participants

- Eight participants (two men and six women)

- Ages between 65 and 82

• Two different applications from the Google Play Stores: BigLauncher and Fontrillo

• Checklist Mobile accessibility guidelines for older people

• Three different stages

- Older users performed some easy tasks daily with two applications

- Interviews were conducted

- A user survey was carried out

Participants

Sample Apps

Big Launcher App

Big Launcher App (1:56): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=name.kunes.android.launcher.demo&hl=enFontrillo App (0:39): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fontrillo&hl=en

Fontrillo App

Procedure• Two different sessions

- 1st session: a simple and brief explanation of the research to the participants - 2nd session: instruction about how to install the apps and how to perform

simple tasks using the two apps• Simple tasks

- Make a call- Look for a contact- Add a contact- Text a contact- Review the calls list- Take a picture- Look for the picture you just took- Search for WhatsApp and use it

• High-skilled tasks- configure emergency call numbers

Questionnaires

Analysis and Results

W3CU002 Popups makes me hard the use of the application.

WDG-BWF Popups or alert messages makes hard to use the application.

GB002 There are so many links or buttons that make me hard to understand and to use the application.

Analysis and ResultsBigLauncher Fontrillo

• Easier to use than Fontrillo• Interface is very visual (e.g. big icons with

metaphors that users understand well)• Includes only a main interface; users don’t need

to navigate• Users understand better and are more

comfortable• All participants completed the simple tasks• Many of them performed the high-level skilled

task

• Has more complete than BigLauncher (e.g. a different way of the alphabetical keyboard for text)• Not visual as BigLauncher• All participants completed the easy tasks with a little bit

longer time than BigLauncher• Only two participants completed the high-level skilled task

• One of the users changed to Fontrillo because Fontrillo provides a flashlight.

• No additional new functionalities that could be useful for older people.

• Harder to use and understand• Transitions from left to right make the users confused.• Only two users chose Fontrillo because they have been

using this for a long time.

Conclusions and Future Work• Both applications show similar results.• The participants concluded that both applications fit well for their needs.• Most of the participants preferred BigLauncer due to its easiness of use.• Main weakness of this evaluation: none of the participants had severe disabilities• Criteria only focuses on addressing accessibility issues, such as vision and hearing.

Future Research• More studies over their checklist• Extensible to iOS or Window Phone applications to extend the current checklist• Extended new features, such as - task-oriented like call or information search - context-dependent like videophone or desktop application

ReferencesDiaz-Bossini, J-M, Moreno, L. & Martinez, P. (2014). Towards mobile accessibility for older people: a

user centered evaluation. UAHCI/HCII 2014, Part III, LNCS 8515, pp. 58-68.

Google Play, Big Launcher (video & images): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=name.kunes.android.launcher.demo&hl=en

Google Play, Fontrillo (video & images):https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fontrillo&hl=en

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The older population. http://www.aoa.acl.gov/Aging_Statistics/Profile/2013/3.aspx

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. World population aging.http://www.nia.nih.gov/research/dbsr/world-population-aging

Population Reference Bureau. World population aging: clocks illustrate growth in population under age 5 and over age 65.http://www.prb.org/Publications/Articles/2011/agingpopulationclocks.aspx