Jane Bringolf, Author at - Page 87 of 109

Colour perceptions vary across cultures

Anyone interested in optimal colours for web and phone might be interested in a project that came out of a colour matching game app. The game is based on colour perception. Feedback data showed designers how people perceive colour. With the help of academics they began to analyse the data in meaningful ways. Preliminary analysis indicates there is a variation across countries. For example, Norwegians were better at colour matching than Saudi Arabians. Singaporeans struggled to identify greens, and Scandinavians did best with red-purple hues. Research papers are to follow which could lead to more inclusive colour choices. The article concludes,

“But the fruits of the project live on in open source. A generic version of Jose’s tools to query the Specimen dataset are hosted here on github. My greatest hope is other researchers find and make use of what was gathered, and that other designers and engineers consider leveraging play in unexpected ways”.

The title of the article on FastCompany website is, Our viral app made less than $1,000. We’d still do it again.

Picture courtesy FastCompany.

What’s disability got to do with climate change?

Climate change is affecting everyone, but when a catastrophic event occurs some people are more at risk than others. Evacuation, temporary shelter, and access to specialist assistance pose specific problems for older people, children and people with disability. So the UN is calling on governments to listen to those who are most affected by natural disasters.

Some countries and regions have disaster plans that pay attention to vulnerable groups. But individuals rarely have plans. Many older people and people with disability are not able to evacuate as quickly as others. Accessing assistance afterwards is also a problem. As a disaster can cause disability this aspect is all the more important. This is one of the findings in Disability and Development Report which collated data from more than 100 countries. The specific section on disasters is on page 240. The situation appears to be the same in both developed and developing countries.

You can read an overview in the Pacific Standard article, The UN is calling for inclusion of people with disabilities in the climate change debate.

Safe Evacuation for All

Next time you have a fire drill take a moment to consider whether anyone could be experiencing difficulty getting out. And it is not all about mobility issues. In a real situation some people are likely to panic or experience high levels of anxiety. Fire wardens can be trained to manage these situations, but is the design of the building helpful as well? The guide, Safe Evacuation for All has some really useful information to help.

The guide is for anyone involved in planning and managing safe evacuation from buildings. This includes facilities and accommodation staff, health and safety staff, access officers, human resource professionals and others. Design professionals and fire engineers will find it useful too. The guide was developed by the National Disability Authority in Ireland. Each section is available to download separately: the guide, a risk assessment checklist and a PEEP template.

The aims of this publication are to:

- encourage anyone preparing an evacuation plan to consider the needs of people of all ages, sizes, abilities and disabilities;
- help those responsible for buildings to recognise the evacuation features relevant for people with disabilities;
- give guidance on providing safe evacuation for everyone; and
- identify good practice in providing safe evacuation for everybody.

The title of the guide is, Safe Evacuation for All.

Smart devices but confused users

Systems and devices expect people to adapt to them – to work out how to use them and to use them successfully. But it should be the other way round. This is the point Edward Steinfeld discusses in The Conversation article. Whether it’s phones, smart watches, car technology and hearing aids, they all have options that aren’t always easy to activate and manage. And it isn’t just the older population that gets confused.

“In many ways, advanced technology is inherently complicated: If users want devices that can do incredible things, they need to deal with the complexity required to deliver those services. But the interfaces designers create often make it difficult to manage that complexity well, which confuses and frustrates users, and may even drive some to give up in despair of ever getting the darn things to work right… With manufacturers’ help, more seniors could enjoy the benefits of advanced technology, without the frustrations”.

The title of the article is Better design could make mobile devices easier for seniors to use. Nicely written and many will relate to his personal and professional researcher experiences.

Note: Ed Steinfeld is better known for leading the Center for Inclusive Design and Environmental Access at Buffalo.

Tourism for All Manual

Tourism is big business, but some operators are missing out. State and local governments have an interest in tourism and they can lead the way for operators. The Accessible Tourism for All Manual shows how.

The manual is a simplified version of a larger research project and this makes it easy to follow in five separate modules.

Module 1 gives a definition and context for accessible tourism. Module 2 is about accessibility chain, and Module 3 is about action and implementation.

Module 4 is about evaluation and progress, and Module 5 provides principles, tools and good practice examples.

The full title of the publication is, Accessible Tourism for All: An Opportunity Within our Reach. The research paper with greater detail is Manual on Accessible Tourism for All: Principles, Tools and Best Practices.

From the abstract:

The Manual on Accessible Tourism for All: Principles, Tools and Good Practices is intended to provide stakeholders with a useful tool to understand the needs of the tourism sector in terms of accessibility, the competitive advantages of tourism for all, and the methods for its implementation.

Home Builder goes for universal design

A home builder in Queensland, is building Livable Housing Silver level homes and he wants everyone else to follow his lead. He has persuaded Townsville City Council and industry stakeholders to come together to make this possible.

In a promotional video accessibility is only mentioned once at the end, but the key features are pointed out throughout the video. It’s a slow 11 minutes so recommend viewing at an increased speed setting. Although Silver level is promoted, the size and design of the dwelling makes it closer to Gold level.

In a 9 minute video (below) various people explain the importance of Silver level to them. The best parts of the video are in the second half where Martin Locke shows how Silver level homes are modern and “normal”. One key point is that it shows there are no design or technical impediments for having Silver (or Gold) level in all new housing.

Wheelchair users are only one part of the story of universal design in housing. The emphasis on wheelchair users perpetuates the idea that this is “disability housing” and this puts it in the “specialised housing” bracket. The Livable Housing Design Guidelines are about everyone, not just wheelchair users.

Locke believes Silver level can be rolled out without additional regulation. However, after ten years of voluntary guidelines, industry has not participated. The industry, particularly mass market builders, rely on regulation to hold the system together so that all the designers, engineers, and trades know what they are doing and can work in tandem.

It’s great to see at least one community trying to make a difference in this space. Martin Locke and the Townsville City Mayor are to be congratulated for their efforts in bringing people together to show the way for the house-building industry.

Connect me to my car

Gerard Goggin has written a thoughtful piece on the issue of automated vehicles and how they might, or might not, be a boon for people with disability. The value of automated vehicles for people with disability is often mentioned in articles related to this technology, but will that value be realised? The article raises some important points about the depiction of disability and how it is communicated and how that plays out into the world of technological development. Goggin covers “blind driving”, developments by Google and Waymo and more. Mentioning the inclusion of older people and people with disability as good news stories is insufficient to put these users at the centre of designs. Written in academic style but important thinking going on here. The title of the article is, Disability, Connected Cars, and Communication.

Introduction: In this article, I take up a highly visible theme in discourses, experimentation, and manufacture of connected cars and autonomous vehicles: disability. I analyze the leading ways in which this new kind of technology is imagined for particular users with disability, as in the highly publicized case of Google’s pilot driverless vehicle promoted as a boon for blind people and those with vision impairments. Then, I try to stand this kind of framing of connected-cars-as-good-for-disability on its head, and discuss the implications for questions of emerging social technology, equality, diversity, and design. Reflecting on this analysis, I look at what disability tells us about connected cars, and, indeed, how we might rethink communication and technology.

Note: Gerard Goggin co-authored a book, “Disability in Australia: exposing a social apartheid”. Written in 2005, it is still relevant today. It can be bought online or accessed through the National Library of Australia.

Older people value outdoor spaces

What makes a city or community age-friendly? The World Health Organization has researched this and produced a comprehensive guide. But sometimes it pays to drill down to the detail at a more local level. Older adults’ perceptions of public spaces could be different to younger people. A research paper from Stockholm looked at green spaces, transport infrastructure and urban development and growth. The methods included visual methods and focus groups. The title of the paper is Promoting ‘Age-Friendly’ Cities: Assessing Elderly Perceptions of Public Spaces.

The report concludes that respondents gave a high degree of importance to green spaces, features that promote continuity and connection to local histories. Spaces that encourage social interaction were also important. Loss of identity or character of buildings, as well as being inaccessible and poorly lit, added to feelings of discomfort.

Editor’s comment: The speed of, and need for, urban growth must include population ageing in its plans. Dismissing the feelings of older people as being “out of touch” or “not liking change” can have unintended consequences.

Picture by Maria Michelle.

Underground movement and wayfinding

Station in Singapore showing complexity of design with escalators and shiny surfaces. — Underground train station

A complex underground interchange station is a good subject for studying wayfinding. Legibility of the environment is more than just signage. When going underground people are more likely to become disorientated. So underground movement and wayfinding is a special area of work.

In a short paper, the researchers from Singapore focus on different materials used to see what difference they make. They looked mainly at colour contrast and glare from lighting. Legibility of the environment helps people who cannot read signs as well as helping to quickly orientate people who can. The article looks to be a translation to English but the content is understandable.

Abstract

Getting lost and disoriented due to the lack of legibility of the space are common problems found in underground stations. Wayfinding inside underground stations is often thought as being solely supported by the presence of signage and directory maps as the tools that help users to understand their orientation and route better. However, the influence of materials on wayfinding in underground stations is often overlooked. Hence this paper presents a comprehensive examination of literature studies and an analysis on Dhoby Ghaut Station in Singapore as case studies. This station serves three interchange MRT lines and complex routes, which renders wayfinding issues even more urgent.

The goal of this paper is to examine the potential of contrasting the material application for effective wayfinding inside the underground station. To identify aspects regarding the impact of selection and placement of materials applied (on floors, walls, and ceilings of underground stations), literature and case study are carried out. The results indicate that the materials used in underground station influences wayfinding in varying degrees.

The title of the paper is, Influence of material application to wayfinding issue in underground station design.

Accessible home design

Lifemark and BRANZ, the building research organisation in New Zealand, have produced a guideline titled Universal Design for Houses. The drawings and design ideas are based on accessible home design for wheelchair users. This is useful for understanding circulation space that’s good for wheelchair users and also good for everyone. However, not everything good for wheelchair users is good for everyone – so not exactly universal design.

The guide is concise and has lots of graphs to illustrate design ideas. Topics include what’s legally required, getting in and out of the home, wet areas, kitchens, hardware and lifts in dwellings.

For more universal application in all homes, see the Livable Housing Design Guidelines.

Editor’s comment: Translating the term universal design into designs for wheelchair users is a common error. But if you need to design for a generic wheelchair user, this is a good guide.

Be safe at home

Safety, slips, trips and falls are the topic of a Lifemark article, Better Design, Safer Homes,. It points out how many people fall and injure themselves at home. They also cut and burn themselves badly enough to need hospital treatment. How could such injuries be avoided so that people are sate at home? The article on has tips for stairs, bathrooms, kitchens, and entrances.

The article concludes, “A safer home benefits all occupants (and visitors), not just older people. Children, in particular will benefit from a design that recognises and addresses risk areas and by doing so creates a more liveable space for everyone”. Lifemark is based in New Zealand.

Step this way with no step

There’s lots of myths and worries about universal design features in homes. The no-step entrance is one of them. A covered entrance, which is great in itself, will keep away the rain and it’s also shade in the summer. A slight grade away from the entrance should deal with the rest. In fact, that is also good for all homes. And it’s easy to do when the home is first built. But people ask why have a no-step entrance when you don’t need it?

It’s based on the assumption that only wheelchair users need it. Think again. A new home means furniture deliveries. Perhaps a new baby on the way – yes, that’s the stroller or pram. Coming home with bags of shopping or a shopping trolley. And let’s not forget the teenager with a broken leg, or grandma who uses a wheelie walker. A no-step entry means everyone can visit and take part in family life. So it’s not just about now – it’s also about the future.

When it comes to cost, if it did cost a bit extra, how much would it be worth to you? The value of not going to institutional care sooner than you need to? The value of having a close family member come to your Christmas dinner? And what about the costly modifications you might need down the track.

The Universal Design Project based in UK has a podcast and transcript that discusses this subject in more detail with a case study.

It’s also good to consider access to the patio or alfresco so that everyone can enjoy the family gathering.

The 2022 edition of the National Construction Code now has the Livable Housing Design Standard which will be mandatory in October 2023.

Web designers are diverse too

The diversity of users is often discussed in relation to universal design and accessibility. But what about the diversity of web designers and their preferences? A research team in Norway checked this out with software designers and found there are “significant differences in team members’ preferences, particularly for those with different roles”. So, software teams should not choose a single method for all team members when it comes to creating accessible web designs.

The research report covers an evaluation of methods preferred by developers and those testing for different impairments. Developers preferred more technical methods and personas. Testers who use the WCAG* walk-through regularly did not rate this method highly, perhaps because they find it tiresome. This indicates a need for a different method to be developed.

The title of the paper is What Methods Software Teams Prefer When Testing Web Accessibility, by Bai, Stray & Mork.

*WCAG is the World Content Accessibility Guidelines which are international standards published by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

Editor’s Note: It is likely that this line of questioning applies to other design fields too.

Author: Jane Bringolf

Colour perceptions vary across cultures

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