Inclusive Design aims to design environments, products and services that are truly accessible, meeting the challenges of health, well-being and quality of life for all users. In the digital field, many legislations have been issued to ensure accessible and inclusive user experiences such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), mandatory for public administrations and many private companies. However, complying with the WCAG does not guarantee a pleasant user experience, continuous discussion with users through interviews, questionnaires, focus groups and usability tests is needed. In fact, it turns out that online tools only detect 20% of the problems, the rest has to be tested with real users. Complying with accessibility and usability standards means extending access to information to all. Despite the growth of scientific publications on accessibility, analyses of municipal and government sites reveal problems. For example, a study of 356 government sites in Norway in 2022 showed that none of them met the minimum requirements of WCAG; similar studies in the United States revealed the same problems. This study, conducted in collaboration with a software house in Genoa, analysed a service of the Ligurian public administration and conducted usability testing sessions with a large panel of users. The website under analysis allows citizens to submit instances, applications and requests for permits. The main objective is to collect detailed data in collaboration with the development team to optimise the site in the short term and to define best practices for UX design. The paper intends to present a preliminary phase of the research: conducting two pilot tests to identify problems in the test track and optimise the tasks. The pilot tests simulated the entire procedure: introduction, initial questions, tour of the homepage, performance of the tasks and filling in satisfaction questionnaires. Problems that emerged were solved by optimising the task descriptions, making some instructions more explicit and correcting errors in the supporting documents. Once the preliminary phase has been completed, the test will be conducted with 16 users differing in age, education, origin and disability. The report generated will be fundamental to the redesign of the portal and to the definition of best practices for the development of accessible and usable content.
Oltre le linee guida: analisi pilota di usabilità e accessibilità per un sito della pubblica amministrazione
Francesca Rocca
2024
Abstract
Inclusive Design aims to design environments, products and services that are truly accessible, meeting the challenges of health, well-being and quality of life for all users. In the digital field, many legislations have been issued to ensure accessible and inclusive user experiences such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), mandatory for public administrations and many private companies. However, complying with the WCAG does not guarantee a pleasant user experience, continuous discussion with users through interviews, questionnaires, focus groups and usability tests is needed. In fact, it turns out that online tools only detect 20% of the problems, the rest has to be tested with real users. Complying with accessibility and usability standards means extending access to information to all. Despite the growth of scientific publications on accessibility, analyses of municipal and government sites reveal problems. For example, a study of 356 government sites in Norway in 2022 showed that none of them met the minimum requirements of WCAG; similar studies in the United States revealed the same problems. This study, conducted in collaboration with a software house in Genoa, analysed a service of the Ligurian public administration and conducted usability testing sessions with a large panel of users. The website under analysis allows citizens to submit instances, applications and requests for permits. The main objective is to collect detailed data in collaboration with the development team to optimise the site in the short term and to define best practices for UX design. The paper intends to present a preliminary phase of the research: conducting two pilot tests to identify problems in the test track and optimise the tasks. The pilot tests simulated the entire procedure: introduction, initial questions, tour of the homepage, performance of the tasks and filling in satisfaction questionnaires. Problems that emerged were solved by optimising the task descriptions, making some instructions more explicit and correcting errors in the supporting documents. Once the preliminary phase has been completed, the test will be conducted with 16 users differing in age, education, origin and disability. The report generated will be fundamental to the redesign of the portal and to the definition of best practices for the development of accessible and usable content.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.