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Towards Universal Accessibility on the Web: Do Grammar Checking Tools Improve Text Readability?

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Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction. Design Approaches and Supporting Technologies (HCII 2020)

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Abstract

Readable text is a key ingredient in a universally accessible web. WCAG2.1 recommends that text should be readable by someone with basic schooling, a criterion that is hard to quantify and implement. Writers rely on qualitative clear-language recommendations, their own experience, and tools. This study set out to investigate if one class of such tools, automatic grammar checkers, has a measurable effect on the readability of text. A controlled experiment was conducted employing 15 participants who brought a piece of their own writing to the experiment tasked with improving the text using a grammar checker. Changes in readability of the text before and after applying the grammar tool were measured. Results show that there were significant reductions in error rates by applying the grammar tool, while there were no significant effects on readability. The results suggest that other automatic tools beside grammar checkers are needed to improve readability. These results have implications for web content providers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Oslo Metropolitan University, 0130, Oslo, Norway

    Hitesh Mohan Kaushik, Evelyn Eika & Frode Eika Sandnes

  2. Kristiania University College, 0153, Oslo, Norway

    Frode Eika Sandnes

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  1. Hitesh Mohan Kaushik
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  2. Evelyn Eika
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  3. Frode Eika Sandnes
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Correspondence to Frode Eika Sandnes .

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  1. Foundation for Research and Technology – Hellas (FORTH), Heraklion, Crete, Greece

    Margherita Antona

  2. University of Crete and Foundation for Research and Technology – Hellas (FORTH), Heraklion, Crete, Greece

    Constantine Stephanidis

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Kaushik, H.M., Eika, E., Sandnes, F.E. (2020). Towards Universal Accessibility on the Web: Do Grammar Checking Tools Improve Text Readability?. In: Antona, M., Stephanidis, C. (eds) Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction. Design Approaches and Supporting Technologies. HCII 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12188. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49282-3_19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49282-3_19

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-49282-3

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