WCAG Principle 1: Perceivable
Today, we are looking at the first principle of accessibility, “Perceivable.” Find out the importance of this principle and how it affects users with certain disabilities.
Enjoy your read, and see you in the next episode!
The foremost principle of accessibility, “Perceivable,” states that all information and user interface components must be presented to users in ways they can perceive.
Users must be able to access all information with at least one of their senses. If some important content is hidden to ALL of a user’s senses, the content is not considered perceivable.
Web content accessibility makes it possible for users who have impairments in any of their senses to be able to access all information with another. Read on for examples of this.
The blind cannot see images
That sounds like an obvious statement, but needs to be carefully considered. Often times, images and other graphical UI controls on websites are not properly labelled in code.
In such cases, users with visual impairments who depend on assistive technologies like screen readers or digital braille displays, or other adaptive strategies will not benefit from the information as a sighted user would.
The deaf cannot hear sound
Similarly, when media content which contain audio do not provide text equivalents (i.e., captions or transcripts), users who are deaf or hard of hearing will find it difficult or impossible to consume such content.
Captions and transcripts are also useful to deaf-blind users who depend on digital braille displays, since electronic text can be output to braille format.
Some have colour deficiency
Some people have “colour blindness,” the decreased ability to see colour or differences in colour. When colour is used as the ONLY means of distinguishing information, such users are unable to perceive the differences.
Other users with low vision, older people, and people with low contrast sensitivity find it difficult to read text that has insufficient contrast with its background.
User preferences can alter presentation
Yes, your layout looks amazing on design, and the code has been written perfectly to match. But not all users can (or will) see your landing page just as you’ve designed it.
Some software might extract components of the information, or change how it appears, to suit the preference of the user. But if the content is not properly structured in code, it will not adapt well to the user’s needs.
For example, someone with a cognitive disability might need to extract just the main content to read in a special, text-only viewer. But does your code identify which part of the content is the most important?
Up next…
In the upcoming episode, we will dive into the first WCAG guideline under this principle, “1.1 — Text Alternatives,” and look at some coding tips and strategies to help make web content perceivable. See you!
Stay tuned for more!
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This article was written as an accessible alternative to the post shared on my LinkedIn account.
