KSEF R&D Excellence: Evaluating and Refining Web Interface Design Guidelines for Alzheimer's Patients

  • Holsapple, Clyde (PI)
  • Pakath, Ramakrishnan (CoI)

Grants and Contracts Details

Description

PROJECT SUMMARY Evaluating and Refining Web Interface Design Guidelines for Alzheimer's Patients Principal Investigator Clyde W. Holsapple, Ph.D. Co-Principal Investigator Ramakrishnan (Ram) Pakath, Ph.D. Affiliation DSIS Area, School of Management Suite 425, C. M. Gatton College of Business and Economics University of Kentucky Lexington, KY 40506-0034. Email PI: [email protected]..!!. CO.PI: [email protected]; [email protected] Phone PI: 859-257-5326; 859-257-3080 (area secretary) CO.PI: 859-257-4319 (persona/); 859-257-3080 (area secretary) Fax 859-257-8031. Contained within the multifaceted, multidisciplinary foci of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) research is work related to "the learn ability of interfaces" and "human performance" with specific interface designs. An extensive review of published HCI research reveals few pieces related to web interface design for Alzheimer's patients. The National Institute on Aging projects that by 2050, 14 million Americans will develop the affliction, over 80 million will exceed age 65, and the Worker/Retiree ratio will shrink to 2. The implication is that despite the national proliferation of internet access for business and non-commercial use, we are quite likely to face an unprecedented "intra-national digital divide," one where a significant, growing population chunk is isolated from effectively harnessing the Net due to inappropriate interface design. Bodies such as the W3C's User Agent Accessibility Guidelines Working Group have advanced guidelines (e.g., UAWG 1.0; 1997-2002) and the Congress has enacted a law (Rehabilitation Act-Section 508; 1998) to make IT more accessible to disabled users. Yet, a vast majority of websites (governmental sites included) fail to conform to these recommendations. While commendable efforts are underway to help foster compliance, a fundamental issue remains: we are unaware of rigorous research evidence demonstrating clear benefits to compliance. Our work focuses on specific aspects of this research opportunity. We seek to compare web interfaces with differing degrees of UAWG to/Section 508 compliance to examine their impact on Alzheimer's patients in terms of the two foci mentioned earlier - "the leamability of and "human performance with" each interface. We hope to extract the more useful guidelines from those currently available in terms of predefined learning rate and performance measures and to stipulate guidelines heretofore unavailable by adapting and making use of behavioral models from IS research such as the Technology Acceptance Model. Key Words/Phrases: Alzheimer's Disease, Disabled, Technology Acceptance Model, UAWG 1.0. Rehabilitation Act - Section 508.
StatusFinished
Effective start/end date6/1/045/31/07

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