EU-funded study on Multimodality
Accessibility is about providing alternatives. If there are stairs leading up to the door and your friend in a wheelchair is coming to visit, there is a need for an elevator, or maybe a ramp if there is just a couple of steps. The same goes for the digital world.
When it comes to the diverse needs of people – with and without disabilities – offering alternative modes (text, illustrations, video …) is really the essence of inclusion. This is the background of a study on multimodality that has been recently published and presented at a hybrid event in Brussels.
The study was commissioned by the European Commission as part of the flagship initiative AccessibleEU, and carried out by Digital Europe with Susanna Laurin as the main author.
Multimodality at the service of accessibility
Multimodality as a term is often used in ICT, but rarely in connection to accessibility. Yet, the core of the concept is about providing alternatives, which is the key to making sure various user needs are met in digital interfaces.
In this context, the study research questions focused on multimodality as a way of achieving accessibility, its current status and potential as well as the connection to standards, policy and legislation.
The European Accessibility Act (EAA) doesn’t specifically mention multimodality, but it does require certain products and services to “maximise their foreseeable use” by persons with disabilities, and information being made “available via more than one sensory channel”. Accessibility experts who are used to working with standards will recognize this as the concept of “multiple ways”.
Seen from the perspective of offering alternatives, requirements can be divided into three categories:
- Direct multimodality, requiring an alternative mode of presentation or operation.
- Indirect multimodality, requiring making it possible to render the alternative mode of presentation with client-based assistive technology.
- Personalisation, requiring that the presentation is adjustable by the individual user.
From the industry perspective, the background or reason for offering multimodality as a feature is often the strive for customer satisfaction, often described as good user experience (UX).
Multimodal solutions in products and services can be:
- developed to meet specific accessibility needs,
- emanating from accessibility requirements, but beneficial to a wide range of users, or
- inherent to the technology itself, that is completely mainstream, with a substantial impact on accessibility.
This means that implementation of multimodal accessibility solutions is not always considered separately, but rather as an integrated part of product design and development.
Contact
Susanna Laurin
susanna.laurin@stiftelsenfunka.org