Towards Understanding Sensory Substitution for Accessible Visualization: An Interview Study

Chundury, Pramod; Patnaik, Biswaksen; Reyazuddin, Yasmin; Tang, Christine Kha; Lazar, Jonathan; Elmqvist, Niklas

doi:10.1109/tvcg.2021.3114829

Cited by 34 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…How do they keep track of where they are? In our co‐design process, we found it easiest for a user to remember their location relative to a known starting point, which is corroborated by literature on developing spatial awareness for blind people [WG69; LKM∗19; CPR∗21]. Hajas noted the prevalence of the Home and End shortcuts across applications for returning to a known position in a bounded space (e.g.…”

Section: Design Dimensions For Rich Screen Reader Experiencessupporting

confidence: 73%

“…Methods. We began by studying the development of multi‐sensory graphical systems, covering work in critical cartography [WG69; Koc12], blind education [AS01; GL15], tactile graphics [FFTI18; HMM∗11; dGMB21; AC97; BHR∗21], and multi‐sensory visualization [MTS19; CPR∗21; BTOJ10; BMD∗16]. Drawing on conventions and literature on crip, reflective, and participatory design [Ham13; SBDK05; Cos20], all authors began an iterative co‐design process with Hajas, who is a blind researcher with relevant expertise.…”

Section: Design Dimensions For Rich Screen Reader Experiencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Rich Screen Reader Experiences for Accessible Data Visualization

Zong

Lee

Lundgard

et al. 2022

Computer Graphics Forum

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Current web accessibility guidelines ask visualization designers to support screen readers via basic non‐visual alternatives like textual descriptions and access to raw data tables. But charts do more than summarize data or reproduce tables; they afford interactive data exploration at varying levels of granularity—from fine‐grained datum‐by‐datum reading to skimming and surfacing high‐level trends. In response to the lack of comparable non‐visual affordances, we present a set of rich screen reader experiences for accessible data visualization and exploration. Through an iterative co‐design process, we identify three key design dimensions for expressive screen reader accessibility: structure, or how chart entities should be organized for a screen reader to traverse; navigation, or the structural, spatial, and targeted operations a user might perform to step through the structure; and, description, or the semantic content, composition, and verbosity of the screen reader's narration. We operationalize these dimensions to prototype screen‐reader‐accessible visualizations that cover a diverse range of chart types and combinations of our design dimensions. We evaluate a subset of these prototypes in a mixed‐methods study with 13 blind and visually impaired readers. Our findings demonstrate that these designs help users conceptualize data spatially, selectively attend to data of interest at different levels of granularity, and experience control and agency over their data analysis process. An accessible HTML version of this paper is available at: http://vis.csail.mit.edu/pubs/rich-screen-reader-vis-experiences.

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Section: Design Dimensions For Rich Screen Reader Experiencessupporting

confidence: 73%

Section: Design Dimensions For Rich Screen Reader Experiencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rich Screen Reader Experiences for Accessible Data Visualization

Zong

Lee

Lundgard

et al. 2022

Computer Graphics Forum

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show abstract

“…As a result, most of the charts are entirely inaccessible to the screen-reader tools [87] and even if some charts come with alt texts, such texts often do not follow the above guidelines and fail to provide important information like chart type, axes, or data trends [43]. Chundury et al [23] attempted to understand how individuals with blindness perceive surroundings using non-visual senses and based on their findings they outlined several design considerations for accessible visualizations. Murphy et al [56] ran an empirical study involving 30 blind and partially sighted computer users to find out the day-to-day challenges they face while using the Internet.…”

Section: Accessible Visualizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

SeeChart: Enabling Accessible Visualizations Through Interactive Natural Language Interface For People with Visual Impairments

Alam

Islam

Hoque

2023

Proceedings of the 28th International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces

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“…Sonification used both in comparison to and alongside visualization and tactile methods for accessibility dates as far back as 1985 [MBJ85, FBT97, Bre02, MB06, ZPSL08, CM19]. Some more recent work has explored robust screen reader data interaction techniques [GMS18, Sor16], screen reader user experiences with digital, 2‐D spatial representations, including data visualizations [SHW21, SCWR21], dug deeper into the semantic layers of effective chart descriptions [LS22], and investigated how to better understand the role of sensory substitution [CPR∗22]. Jung et al offer guidance that expands beyond commonly cited literature that chart descriptions are preferably between 2 and 8 sentences long, written in plain language, and with consideration for the order of information and navigation [JMK∗22].…”

Section: Existing Work In Data Visualization and Accessibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

How accessible is my visualization? Evaluating visualization accessibility with Chartability

Elavsky

Bennett

Moritz

2022

Computer Graphics Forum

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Novices and experts have struggled to evaluate the accessibility of data visualizations because there are no common shared guidelines across environments, platforms, and contexts in which data visualizations are authored. Between non‐specific standards bodies like WCAG, emerging research, and guidelines from specific communities of practice, it is hard to organize knowledge on how to evaluate accessible data visualizations. We present Chartability, a set of heuristics synthesized from these various sources which enables designers, developers, researchers, and auditors to evaluate data‐driven visualizations and interfaces for visual, motor, vestibular, neurological, and cognitive accessibility. In this paper, we outline our process of making a set of heuristics and accessibility principles for Chartability and highlight key features in the auditing process. Working with participants on real projects, we found that data practitioners with a novice level of accessibility skills were more confident and found auditing to be easier after using Chartability. Expert accessibility practitioners were eager to integrate Chartability into their own work. Reflecting on Chartability's development and the preliminary user evaluation, we discuss tradeoffs of open projects, working with high‐risk evaluations like auditing projects in the wild, and challenge future research projects at the intersection of visualization and accessibility to consider the broad intersections of disabilities.

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Towards Understanding Sensory Substitution for Accessible Visualization: An Interview Study

Cited by 34 publications

References 61 publications

Rich Screen Reader Experiences for Accessible Data Visualization

Rich Screen Reader Experiences for Accessible Data Visualization

SeeChart: Enabling Accessible Visualizations Through Interactive Natural Language Interface For People with Visual Impairments

How accessible is my visualization? Evaluating visualization accessibility with Chartability

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