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.
Status | Finished |
---|---|
Effective start/end date | 6/1/04 → 5/31/07 |
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