Abstract
The change generated by the virtualization of activities due to the COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the way people participate in countless activities. Scientific conferences, like many other events, were forced by the circumstances to change from face-to-face to online overnight. The goal of this study is to identify the accessibility barriers that the platforms used by scientific online conferences pose for blind participants. The research methodology used was experiential introspection complemented by automated testing. Exploratory tests were conducted by a blind researcher using the JAWS screen reader. Besides, the accessibility evaluation tool WAVE was used to identify non-conformances with the web content accessibility guidelines WCAG. As a result, it was found in some cases a null level of accessibility and, in other cases, complexity was detected in the access to activities. As for no conformances with WCAG, two of the most prominent were empty links and the absence of headings for efficient screen reader navigation. The automated tool showed errors and alerts that need to be fixed in the teleconferencing platforms evaluated. It is presumed that, unfortunately, the moderately or even basic concepts for the participation of users with visual disabilities and blind are not being considered in the platforms used to host virtual scientific conferences.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Klemeš, J.J.: Scientific conferences: organisation, participation and their future. Clean Technol. Environ. Policy 18(2), 347–349 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10098-016-1106-2
Stević, Ž, et al.: A new hybrid model for quality assessment of scientific conferences based on Rough BWM and SERVQUAL. Scientometrics 119(1), 1–30 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-019-03032-z
Gallant, C., Bork, P., Carpenter-Cleland, C., Good, D.: Examining the impact of a 2-day scientific conference on high school students’ interest in STEM and confidence in attending university. Can. J. Sci. Math. Technol. Educ. 20(2), 376–387 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42330-020-00086-7
Vahdati, S., et al.: A comprehensive quality assessment framework for scientific events. Scientometrics 126(1), 641–682 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-020-03758-1
Park, E.Y.: Digital competence and internet use/behavior of persons with disabilities in PC and smart device use. Univ. Access Inf. Soc. (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-020-00782-z
Wehmeyer, M.L., Davies, D.K., Stock, S.E., Tanis, S.: Applied cognitive technologies to support the autonomy of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Adv. Neurodevelopmental Disorders 4(4), 389–399 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41252-020-00179-2
Freedom Scientific: Job Access with Speech JAWS (2021). https://www.freedomscientific.com/products/software/jaws/
WebAIM: WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool (2021). https://wave.webaim.org/
Calle-Jimenez, T., Sanchez-Gordon, S., Luján-Mora, S.: Web Accessibility Evaluation of Massive Open Online Courses on Geographical Information Systems, Global Engineering Education Conference, pp. 680–686 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1109/EDUCON.2014.6826167
W3C: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 (2018). https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/
Sanchez-Gordon, S.: Striving for inclusion in E-Learning and E-Health. In: Negrón, A.P., Muñoz, M. (eds.) Latin American Women and Research Contributions to the IT Field, pp. 44–72. (2021). https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-7552-9.ch003
Aranzazu, R.D.: Info LACCEI. Bulletin 016 (2020). http://laccei.org/Boletines/boletin_11_2020_EN.pdf
Acosta-Vargas, P., Guaña-Moya, J., Acosta-Vargas, G., Villegas-Ch, W., Salvador-Ullauri, L.: Method for assessing accessibility in videoconference systems. In: Russo, D., Ahram, T., Karwowski, W., Di Bucchianico, G., Taiar, R. (eds.) IHSI 2021. AISC, vol. 1322, pp. 669–675. Springer, Cham (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68017-6_99
Kushalnagar, R. S., Vogler, C.: Teleconference accessibility and guidelines for deaf and hard of hearing users. In: 22nd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, pp. 1–6 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1145/3373625.3417299
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Arias-Flores, H., Sanchez-Gordon, S., Calle-Jimenez, T. (2021). Analysis of the Level of Accessibility of Scientific Online Conferences for Blind Participants. In: Ahram, T.Z., Falcão, C.S. (eds) Advances in Usability, User Experience, Wearable and Assistive Technology. AHFE 2021. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 275. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80091-8_67
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80091-8_67
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-80090-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-80091-8
eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)