Presented by: Edy Setiawan

1. Public Management Information SystemsE-Government Visual Accessibilityfor Older Adult User(Shirley Ann Becker - Northern Arizona University)Friday, August 22, 2014 Presented by: Edy Setiawan Public Management & Policy Analysis ProgramGraduate School of International Relations

2. Introduction • This paper basically explain the reality that many government website in the United States were not “user friendly” enough for older adult population. • The fact that >60 years old population is one of the largest user of government website has generated the awareness to address the limitation that older people encounter in accessing the internet. • Many older adults use the web for improving quality and longevity of life, often searching for information to support these goals (health care and medical conditions).

3. Introduction • Problems occurs when the above information needed by older people were not available or easy to obtain due to the design of government websites that do not take into account aging vision. • The challenging part of government, private sector, and also nonprofit organizations is to improve website accessibility for older adults while minimizing cost and resources. • The ultimate goal of this research is the promotion of universal usability whereby computing technology is accessible to all users regardless of age, ethnicity, gender, disability, education, income, culture, and religion.

4. Web Accessibility and Aging Vision One of the challenges facing e-government is designing web pages that are visually accessible for older adults. • Visual Acuity • Visual acuity declines with age and results in a reduced ability to resolve fine details centrally and peripherally on a web page. • Recommendations: • Increasing font size • Using sans seriff instead of serif font • Web objects, including text placed on peripheral of a web page should be adequately sized for improved readability.

5. Web Accessibility and Aging Vision • Contrast Sensitivity • Is a person ability to detect light and dark differences for targets of various sizes. Older people have difficulties to read character in text, especially when the foreground and background color are insufficient in contrast. • Recommendations: • Older adults may need two to three times more contrast than younger adult.

6. Web Accessibility and Aging Vision • Glare Sensitivity • Difficult to distinguish object from their background. • Recommendations: • Avoid web with patterned background, poorly contrasting color, small font size, and inadequate white space surrounding objects. • Color Discrimination • Adults have more difficulty with colors especially violet, blue, green, and yellow ranges. • Recommendations: • Avoid low saturated colors (pastel) or colors close together in hue (blue and green, green and yellow, orange and red)

7. Web Accessibility and Aging Vision • Visual Field • Difficult to see objects on the peripheral of a web page than in the center. • Critical web objects and content should be placed toward the center of the page so that they are more readily found by older adults users.

8. Web Accessibility and Government Initiatives In 1997, the Clinton Administration developed the framework for Global Electronic Commerce. The Government Paperwork Elimination of Act of 1998 provided for electronic maintenance, submission, and disclosure information. Significant step have been made by amending Rehabilitation Act with Section 508 to eliminate barriers in information technology, offer new opportunities for people with disabilities, and foster technology development to make websites accessible for them.

9. Web Accessibility and Government Initiatives The NIA, in conjunction with the National Library of Medicine (NLM), developed web accessibility guidelines to improve the usability of a web page for older adults. These guidelines provide for the effective design of a web page by taking into account font sizes, types, colors, and styles; background images and colors; vertical scrolling; and text formats, among other design issues. www.usability.gov provides research and practitioner based guidelines on design layout, navigation, information content, and other usability aspects of web design targeting the general population of computer users.

10. National Institute on Aging (NIA) Guidelines for Making Senior-Friendly Web Sites

11. Key Tips for Making Your Website Senior Friendly • Break information into short sections. • Give instructions clearly and number each step. • Minimize the use of jargon and technical terms. • Use single mouse clicks. • Allow additional space around clickable targets. • Use 12- or 14-point type size, and make it easy for users to enlarge text. • Use high-contrast color combinations, such as black type against a white background. • Provide a speech function to hear text read aloud. • Provide text-only versions of multimedia content. • Minimize scrolling. • Choose a search engine that uses keywords and doesn’t require special characters or knowledge of Boolean terms.

12. Web Accessibility Software Tools Dottie and the Usability Enforcer software tools have been developed as part of the research to automatically identify visual barriers on government web sites when used by older adults. They offer automated support for promoting senior friendly web sites. They both have evaluation features that assess a web page for compliance with many of the NIA guidelines, particularly those that relate to the visual aspects of web site design.

13. Automated Assessment Results Government Home Page Compliance with National Institute on Aging (NIA) Guidelines

14. Manual Assessment Results Color Issues Associated with Government Home Page

15. Conclusion The government plays an important position in assuring the availability of internet services and resources to all citizens regardless their age, ethnicity, gender, disability, education, income, culture, and religion. Therefore, encouraging more and more government websites that comply with NIA guidelines would be a good role model for other institution.

16. Conclusion The existence of web accessibility software tools such as Dottie and Usability Enforcer has beneficially contributed to the assessment of Section 508 and NIA guidelines compliance. Additional research is needed to expand the functionality of such software tools to comprehensively meet the NIA guidelines.