John R Thompson
Edward Cutrell
ABSTRACT
Even though screen readers are a core accessibility tool for blind and low vision individuals (BLVIs), most visualizations are incompatible with screen readers. To improve accessible visualization experiences, we partnered with 10 BLV screen reader users (SRUs) in an iterative co-design study to design and develop accessible visualization experiences that afford SRUs the autonomy to interactively read and understand visualizations and their underlying data. During the five-month study, we explored accessible visualization prototypes with our design partners for three one-hour sessions. Our results provide feedback on the synthesized design concepts we explored, why (or why not) they aid comprehension and exploration for SRUs, and how differing design concepts can fit into cohesive accessible visualization experiences. We contribute both Chart Reader, a web-based accessibility engine resulting from our design iterations, and our distilled study findings—organized by design dimensions—in the creation of comprehensive accessible visualization experiences.
Supplemental Material
- Apple. 2022. Apple Audio Graphs. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/accessibility/audio_graphs. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Alice Boxhall, James Craig, Dominic Mazzoni, and Alexander Surkov. 2022. The Accessibility Object Model (AOM). https://wicg.github.io/aom/. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Stephen Brewster. 2002. Visualization tools for blind people using multiple modalities. Disability and Rehabilitation 24, 11-12 (2002), 613–621. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638280110111388Google ScholarCross Ref
- Pramod Chundury, Biswaksen Patnaik, Yasmin Reyazuddin, Christine Tang, Jonathan Lazar, and Niklas Elmqvist. 2021. Towards Understanding Sensory Substitution for Accessible Visualization: An Interview Study. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 28, 1(2021), 1084–1094. https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2021.3114829Google ScholarDigital Library
- Frank Elavsky, Cynthia Bennett, and Dominik Moritz. 2022. How accessible is my visualization? Evaluating visualization accessibility with Chartability. Computer Graphics Forum 41, 3 (Jun 2022), 57–70. https://doi.org/10.1111/cgf.14522Google ScholarCross Ref
- Danyang Fan, Alexa F. Siu, Hrishikesh V. Rao, Gene S-H Kim, Xavier Vazquez, Lucy Greco, Sile O’Modhrain, and Sean Follmer. 2022. The Accessibility of Data Visualizations on the Web for Screen Reader Users: Practices and Experiences During COVID-19. ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing (Aug 2022). https://doi.org/10.1145/3557899 Just Accepted.Google ScholarDigital Library
- Sarah L. Fossheim. 2022. How (not) to make accessible data visualizations, illustrated by the US presidential election.https://fossheim.io/writing/posts/accessible-dataviz-us-elections/. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Lars Grammel, Chris Bennett, Melanie Tory, and Margaret-Anne Storey. 2013. A Survey of Visualization Construction User Interfaces. In EuroVis - Short Papers, Mario Hlawitschka and Tino Weinkauf (Eds.). The Eurographics Association. https://doi.org/10.2312/PE.EuroVisShort.EuroVisShort2013.019-023Google ScholarCross Ref
- Sabine Hennig, Fritz Zobl, and Wolfgang W. Wasserburger. 2017. Accessible Web Maps for Visually Impaired Users: Recommendations and Example Solutions. Cartographic Perspectives 88 (Nov 2017), 6–27. https://doi.org/10.14714/CP88.1391Google ScholarCross Ref
- Highcharts. 2022. Accessibility module feature overview. https://www.highcharts.com/docs/accessibility/accessibility-module-feature-overview. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Leona M Holloway, Cagatay Goncu, Alon Ilsar, Matthew Butler, and Kim Marriott. 2022. Infosonics: Accessible Infographics for People Who Are Blind Using Sonification and Voice. In Proceedings of the 2022 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (New Orleans, LA, USA) (CHI ’22). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 480, 13 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3517465Google ScholarDigital Library
- Shakila Cherise S Joyner, Amalia Riegelhuth, Kathleen Garrity, Yea-Seul Kim, and Nam Wook Kim. 2022. Visualization Accessibility in the Wild: Challenges Faced by Visualization Designers. In Proceedings of the 2022 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (New Orleans, LA, USA) (CHI ’22). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 83, 19 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3517630Google ScholarDigital Library
- Crescentia Jung, Shubham Mehta, Atharva Kulkarni, Yuhang Zhao, and Yea-Seul Kim. 2022. Communicating Visualizations without Visuals: Investigation of Visualization Alternative Text for People with Visual Impairments. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 28, 1(2022), 1095–1105. https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2021.3114846Google ScholarDigital Library
- N. W. Kim, S. C. Joyner, A. Riegelhuth, and Y. Kim. 2021. Accessible Visualization: Design Space, Opportunities, and Challenges. Computer Graphics Forum 40, 3 (2021), 173–188. https://doi.org/10.1111/cgf.14298Google ScholarCross Ref
- Richard E. Ladner. 2015. Design for User Empowerment. Interactions 22, 2 (feb 2015), 24–29. https://doi.org/10.1145/2723869Google ScholarDigital Library
- Susie Lu. 2022. D3-Annotation. https://d3-annotation.susielu.com/. (Accessed on Dec. 7, 2022).Google Scholar
- Alan Lundgard, Crystal Lee, and Arvind Satyanarayan. 2019. Sociotechnical Considerations for Accessible Visualization Design. In 2019 IEEE Visualization Conference (VIS). IEEE, New York, NY, USA, 16–20. https://doi.org/10.1109/VISUAL.2019.8933762Google ScholarCross Ref
- Alan Lundgard and Arvind Satyanarayan. 2022. Accessible Visualization via Natural Language Descriptions: A Four-Level Model of Semantic Content. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 28, 1(2022), 1073–1083. https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2021.3114770Google ScholarDigital Library
- Jennifer Mankoff, Gillian R. Hayes, and Devva Kasnitz. 2010. Disability Studies as a Source of Critical Inquiry for the Field of Assistive Technology. In Proceedings of the 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Orlando, Florida, USA) (ASSETS ’10). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 3–10. https://doi.org/10.1145/1878803.1878807Google ScholarDigital Library
- Kim Marriott, Bongshin Lee, Matthew Butler, Ed Cutrell, Kirsten Ellis, Cagatay Goncu, Marti Hearst, Kathleen McCoy, and Danielle Albers Szafir. 2021. Inclusive Data Visualization for People with Disabilities: A Call to Action. Interactions 28, 3 (apr 2021), 47–51. https://doi.org/10.1145/3457875Google ScholarDigital Library
- Microsoft. 2022. Overview of accessibility in Power BI. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/create-reports/desktop-accessibility-overview. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Microsoft. 2022. Screen reader support for Excel. https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/screen-reader-support-for-excel-0976b140-7033-4e2d-8887-187280701bf8. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Priscilla Moraes, Gabriel Sina, Kathleen McCoy, and Sandra Carberry. 2014. Evaluating the Accessibility of Line Graphs through Textual Summaries for Visually Impaired Users. In Proceedings of the 16th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Rochester, New York, USA) (ASSETS ’14). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 83–90. https://doi.org/10.1145/2661334.2661368Google ScholarDigital Library
- Alan F. Newell and Peter Gregor. 2000. “User Sensitive Inclusive Design”– in Search of a New Paradigm. In Proceedings on the 2000 Conference on Universal Usability (Arlington, Virginia, USA) (CUU ’00). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 39–44. https://doi.org/10.1145/355460.355470Google ScholarDigital Library
- SAS. 2022. SAS Graphics Accelerator. https://support.sas.com/software/products/graphics-accelerator/index.html. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Arvind Satyanarayan, Dominik Moritz, Kanit Wongsuphasawat, and Jeffrey Heer. 2017. Vega-Lite: A Grammar of Interactive Graphics. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 23, 1(2017), 341–350. https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2016.2599030Google ScholarDigital Library
- Ather Sharif, Sanjana Shivani Chintalapati, Jacob O. Wobbrock, and Katharina Reinecke. 2021. Understanding Screen-Reader Users’ Experiences with Online Data Visualizations. In Proceedings of the 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Virtual Event, USA) (ASSETS ’21). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 14, 16 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3441852.3471202Google ScholarDigital Library
- Ather Sharif, Olivia H. Wang, and Alida T. Muongchan. 2022. “What Makes Sonification User-Friendly?” Exploring Usability and User-Friendliness of Sonified Responses. In Proceedings of the 24th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Athens, Greece) (ASSETS ’22). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 45, 5 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3517428.3550360Google ScholarDigital Library
- Ather Sharif, Olivia H. Wang, Alida T. Muongchan, Katharina Reinecke, and Jacob O. Wobbrock. 2022. VoxLens: Making Online Data Visualizations Accessible with an Interactive JavaScript Plug-In. In Proceedings of the 2022 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (New Orleans, LA, USA) (CHI ’22). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 478, 19 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3517431Google ScholarDigital Library
- Alexa Siu, Gene S-H Kim, Sile O’Modhrain, and Sean Follmer. 2022. Supporting Accessible Data Visualization Through Audio Data Narratives. In Proceedings of the 2022 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (New Orleans, LA, USA) (CHI ’22). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 476, 19 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3517678Google ScholarDigital Library
- Desmos Studio. 2022. Graphing Calculator. https://www.desmos.com/calculator. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Tableau. 2022. Accessibility: Putting the power of the Tableau Platform into the hands of everyone. https://www.tableau.com/products/accessibility. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- VISA. 2022. VISA Chart Components. https://developer.visa.com/pages/chart-components. (Accessed on Sept. 12, 2022).Google Scholar
- W3C. 2022. WAI-ARIA 1.1 spec. https://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria/. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- W3C. 2022. WAI-ARIA "Complex Images" tutorial. https://www.w3.org/WAI/tutorials/images/complex/. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- W3C. 2022. WAI-ARIA Graphics spec. https://www.w3.org/TR/graphics-aria-1.0/. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- W3C. 2022. Web Audio API. https://www.w3.org/TR/webaudio/. (Accessed on Sept. 4, 2022).Google Scholar
- Jonathan Zong, Crystal Lee, Alan Lundgard, JiWoong Jang, Daniel Hajas, and Arvind Satyanarayan. 2022. Rich Screen Reader Experiences for Accessible Data Visualization. Computer Graphics Forum 41, 3 (2022), 15–27. https://doi.org/10.1111/cgf.14519Google ScholarCross Ref
Index Terms
- Chart Reader: Accessible Visualization Experiences Designed with Screen Reader Users
Recommendations
VoxLens: Making Online Data Visualizations Accessible with an Interactive JavaScript Plug-In
CHI '22: Proceedings of the 2022 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing SystemsJavaScript visualization libraries are widely used to create online data visualizations but provide limited access to their information for screen-reader users. Building on prior findings about the experiences of screen-reader users with online data ...
The Accessibility of Data Visualizations on the Web for Screen Reader Users: Practices and Experiences During COVID-19
Data visualization has become an increasingly important means of effective data communication and has played a vital role in broadcasting the progression of COVID-19. Accessible data representations, however, have lagged behind, leaving areas of ...
Understanding Screen-Reader Users’ Experiences with Online Data Visualizations
ASSETS '21: Proceedings of the 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and AccessibilityOnline data visualizations are widely used to communicate information from simple statistics to complex phenomena, supporting people in gaining important insights from data. However, due to the defining visual nature of data visualizations, extracting ...
Comments