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The Recognition of Web Pages' Hyperlinks by People with Intellectual Disabilities: An Evaluation Study
Author(s) -
Rocha Tânia,
Bessa Maximino,
Gonçalves Martinho,
Cabral Luciana,
Godinho Francisco,
Peres Emanuel,
Reis Manuel C.,
Magalhães Luís,
Chalmers Alan
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
journal of applied research in intellectual disabilities
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.056
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1468-3148
pISSN - 1360-2322
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-3148.2012.00700.x
Subject(s) - hyperlink , perception , task (project management) , web accessibility , computer science , web page , world wide web , multimedia , psychology , information retrieval , engineering , web standards , systems engineering , neuroscience
Background One of the most mentioned problems of web accessibility, as recognized in several different studies, is related to the difficulty regarding the perception of what is or is not clickable in a web page. In particular, a key problem is the recognition of hyperlinks by a specific group of people, namely those with intellectual disabilities. Materials and Methods This experiment investigated a methodology based on the direct observation, video recording, interview and data obtained by an eye tracker device. Ten participants took part in this study. They were divided into two groups and asked to perform two tasks: ‘ S ing a song’ and ‘ L isten to a story’ in two websites. These websites were developed to include specific details. The first website presented an image navigation menu ( INM ), whereas the other one showed a text navigation menu ( TNM ). Results There was a general improvement regarding the participants' performance when using INM s. Conclusion The referred analysis indeed shows that not only did these specific participants gain a better understanding of the demanding task, but also they showed an improved perception concerning the content of the navigation menu that included hyperlinks with images.