Accessible Applications - Study and Design of User Interfaces to Support Users with Disabilities

Abstract

Mobile applications are currently one of the primary means enabling any kind of social and human interaction. Being so pervasive, these applications should be made usable for all users: accessibility collects the guidelines that developers should follow to include features allowing users with disabilities (e.g., visual impairments) to better interact with an application. The external quality and, particularly, the usability of these apps influences the application acceptance and usage patterns. For this reason, developers are increasing their attention to the problem of accessibility, which is the branch of computer-human interaction that defines the guidelines to make an application usable by all users. This article describes the purpose and progress of the author's doctoral studies on user interaction, usability, and motivational questions related to the accessibility of mobile applications.