DRAFT Web Accessibility for Older Users

Editors Draft:
24 November 2008 [changelog]
Latest Draft
Status:
This document is a draft and should not be referenced or quoted under any circumstances. Please send comments to public-comments-wai-age@w3.org (with public archive).

IMPORTANT: Instructions

The Notes section for each slide contains important information. Make sure you can read the Notes. On this slide, the notes start with "[NOTES SECTION: This is where the important information is...]"

Copyright © 2008 W3C® (MIT, ERCIM, Keio)

Notes

[NOTES SECTION This is where the important information is: for each slide.]

Permission and Reference

Note to presenters:
If you plan to use this material for a presentation, please let us know by sending an email to wai-eo-editors@w3.org (a publicly-archived list), or if you do not want it public send it to wai@w3.org. Following your presentation, we would appreciate knowing how many people attended, what questions they had, and such. We also welcome your feedback and suggestions for the presentation.

The "Web Accessibility for Older Users" presentation material is copyright© W3C and licensed under the W3C Document License, with the exception of some of the images. Additionally, you are granted permission to create modifications or derivatives of the material.

All that means that you can copy, change, translate, distribute, and present the "Web Accessibility for Older Users" presentation material as long as you include the reference information below as source material:

Web Accessibility for Older Users, A.M.J. Arch, ed. W3C (MIT, ERCIM, Keio), December 2008. www.w3.org/WAI/WAI-AGE/????

Images

Credits for the images and information on permission to use the images are included in the Notes section where the image first appears.

 

Web Accessibility for Older Users
Findings from the WAI-AGE Project

Last Updated 24 November 2008

Notes

Welcome!

Presentation Overview

Notes

Today I'll be talking about [text on the slide]

Note to presenters:
Remember that some people may not be able to see the slides, for example, people who are blind or people listening to an audio-only recording of the presentation. Make sure that you say all of the information that is on each slide.

Looking forward - Britain

Britain's Ageing Population (BBC 27/8/08)

Notes

[@@ remove the 50+ age group??]

These figure show the ageing trend in the UK ...

Looking forward - Japan

Japan population over 65 years

At the same time, Japan's total population is expected to decline from around 127m people at present to less than 90m people by 2050.

[simple graph?]

Empahasise that in Japan it is currently 1 in 5 over 65; within 5 years it will be 1 in 3
Japan's proportion of people over 65 years is the highest in the world
(Source: Reuters 6/05/08)
(@@ Andrew to check Reuters - numbers in slide bullets only have 25% in 5 years)

Looking forward - Europe

European Union countries - old age dependency ratio

Graph shows population aged 65 and over as a % of the working age population (EC 2007)

Graph of EU countries showing old age dependencies by country

[Andrew to search out data for this graph and create table version and/or a simplified version]

This chart highlights the differences across Europe over the next four decades. In 2005, most countries were close to the EU average of 1 person over 65 for every four of working age (1:4). In 2050, the range is 1:3 for Lithuania and the Netherlands to as high as 1:1.5 in Italy and Spain. Tthe EU average in 2050 will be approximately 1:2.

These changes between 2010 and 2050 emphasises the need to support older people in the workplace and in the community - an accessible Web contributes to this.

Presenters may like to extract the actual numbers for their own country from EuroStat and contrast with EU average

Looking forward - another country

Another country's population over 65 years

details as available

some notes about the data ...

Implications


At the same time, online participation is developing and expected:

Notes

These previous statistics are resulting in working ages being extended, and with that goes lifelong learning.

Furthermore, all forms of community participation are going online (see list). Older people are expected and wanting to participate.

Ageing and Functional Impairments

Vision decline

Hearing loss

Motor skill diminishment

Impairment often accomnaies the ageing process - vision loss, hearing loss, motor skill diminishment ... discuss the statistics

More detailed data is available from Web Accessibility for Older Users: A Literature Review

Ageing and Cognitive Limitations

Dementia estimates:

Mild Cognitive Impairment is more common:

Notes

Congnitive impairment is also commmon. While Dementia affects part of the older population (statistics), forms of mild cognitive impirment are much more common - problems with short term memory (which may result in a person forgetting the prupose of a web site visit if they get "lost" on the site), and concentration and distraction issues also common. (Maybe mention the multiple animated advertisemnets that appear on some pages.)

more detailed data is available from Web Accessibility for Older Users: A Literature Review

...

Older people are different!

Myths:

Changing rapidly!

Notes

... there is a common misconception that older people can't use and don't use computers, or even need them. Older people are rapidly coming online - they are the fastest growing group. And older people undertake similar activities to younger poeple - such as health, travel, banking, government interaction - even if they don't use facilities as such as Facebook as often as some younger people.

Data about older people online is available from the Literature Review]

WAI-AGE Project

EC project focused on:

WAI-AGE Project background

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Types of Literature surveyed

Various categories of literature were included in the review:

See "Web Accessibility for Older Users: A Literature Review" for details

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Literature observations

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Characteristics of older Web users

Older users increasingly exhibit certain characteristics:

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Findings … (1)

Most requirements identified for the elderly overlap with those for people with disabilities:

WCAG 2.0 addresses these

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Findings … (2)

Some requirements identified for older users may also assist people with disabilities:

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Other Observations

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Next steps

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Documents for revision

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New WAI documents planned

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Participation welcome

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Research welcome

Some gaps that need to be answered:

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Questions

Project Web site:

 

The WAI-AGE Project is supported by:

6th Framework Programme 2002 to 2006

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