Software Methods for Age and Disability
Determines how computing and information technologies can enable people to gain access to facilities, services, devices, and information that is otherwise unattainable.
Access to full participation in life has been a recurrent research theme in Applied Computing since 1980; establishing us as one of the world's most experienced research teams in this area. Our pragmatic approach in problem-solving merges access requirements with appropriate computing solutions making best use of current thinking in interaction design.
Research outputs include software, scholarly publications and accessibility research reports for commercial clients. Funding sponsorship includes UK Research Councils, charities, the European Union, and the commercial sector. The group advises the Scottish Government on their strategy for an ageing population and the British Government on e-inclusion strategy. A current project is to help to close the digital divide between older and younger people.
Our contributions to research have included innovative ways to alleviate the effects of dyslexia (Best Paper Awards, Assets 2000 and BJET 2002), interactive cognitive aids for memory loss that enable three-way communication between user, carer, and system via mobile technology, devising simpler and configurable user interfaces for browsers and email, exploring the use of interactive television by older people, developing text processing aids for dyslexia, and building methods for accessible design. Additionally, our leading UK accessibility research consultancy, the Digital Media Access Group combines research and commercial accessibility application that include clients such as Scottish Power, Yahoo!, University of Oxford, and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). It has pioneered a methodology which forms the basis of most recognised online accessibility audit methodologies today.
People working within this theme: John Arnott, Nick Hine, Iain Murray, Annalu Waller, Norman Alm, Lorna Gibson, Peter Gregor, Louise McIver, Alan Newell
Research projects related to this theme: How was School today...? in the Wild
View publications related to this theme