Glossary
Searchable terminology from accessibility, web standards, and related fields.
221 results found in Cognitive Accessibility.
- Demand Avoidance (Pathological Demand Avoidance, PDA, Persistent Drive for Autonomy)
- An inner resistance to perceived demands — even self-imposed ones — that can lead to inability to start, change, or complete tasks. Demand avoidance is associated with an autism profile sometimes call…
- Dementia
- A group of progressive neurological conditions that affect memory, thinking, orientation, comprehension, language, and judgment. Alzheimer's disease is the most common form. Dementia significantly imp…
- Developmental Learning Disorder (DLD, Specific Learning Disorder, Learning Disability)
- A group of neurodevelopmental conditions that affect the acquisition and use of specific academic skills such as reading, writing, or mathematics. Developmental Learning Disorders include dyslexia (af…
- Digital Stimming (Digital self-stimulation)
- The deliberate, controlled engagement with digital content — typically apps, videos, or sites commonly labeled as 'distracting' — as a self-regulatory or soothing behavior, analogous to physical stimm…
- Digital Well-Being (Digital wellbeing, Digital wellness)
- A field of research, design, and consumer technology focused on supporting healthy, intentional relationships between people and their devices. Digital well-being spans screen-time tracking, attention…
- Distractibility (Attentional Distractibility, Susceptibility to Distraction)
- A cognitive characteristic in which a person has difficulty maintaining focus on a task due to sensitivity to irrelevant stimuli in their environment. Distractibility is a feature of many conditions i…
- Distraction Blocker (Focus app, Website blocker, Digital self-control tool, DSCT)
- A category of digital well-being software designed to restrict access to distracting applications, websites, or notifications so that users can sustain focus on work or study. Distraction blockers ran…
- Distraction Control (Distraction Filtering, Focus Mode)
- Features or tools that help users suppress distracting content on web pages to maintain focus on their primary task. Distraction control ranges from manual tools (like Apple's Distraction Control in S…
- Down Syndrome (Trisomy 21)
- A genetic condition caused by the presence of an extra copy of chromosome 21, resulting in varying degrees of intellectual and developmental differences. People with Down Syndrome may experience chall…
- Down Syndrome (Trisomy 21)
- A genetic condition caused by the presence of an extra copy of chromosome 21, resulting in intellectual disability and characteristic physical features. People with Down syndrome typically experience …
- Dyscalculia (Math Learning Disability, Number Blindness, Mathematics Disorder)
- A specific learning disorder that affects the ability to acquire, understand, and manipulate numerical and mathematical concepts. People with dyscalculia may have difficulty with number sense, memoriz…
- Dysregulation (Emotional Dysregulation, Sensory Dysregulation)
- Dysregulation is a state in which a person's emotional, sensory, or physiological response exceeds what they can manage given the current context - typically manifesting as distress, overwhelm, shutdo…
- Earmarking (Money Earmarking)
- A financial-management practice, studied by sociologist Viviana Zelizer, in which people mentally or materially separate money into distinct categories tied to specific purposes (rent, groceries, savi…
- Entity Density (Entity-Density Features)
- A discourse-level readability feature measuring how many distinct entities — named entities (people, places, organisations) and general nouns — a text introduces per sentence or document. High entity …
- Epilepsy (Seizure Disorder)
- A chronic neurological condition characterized by recurrent, unprovoked seizures caused by abnormal electrical activity in the brain. Epilepsy affects roughly 1% of the population globally and spans a…
- Episodic Memory (Autobiographical Memory, Personal Experience Memory)
- The memory of specific personal experiences and events, including details about what happened, where and when it occurred, and the emotions associated with it. Episodic memory allows people to mentall…
- Error Tolerance (Error Prevention, Forgiveness)
- A design principle requiring that systems anticipate, prevent, and gracefully handle user errors. In accessible design, error tolerance means providing clear validation messages, allowing users to und…
- Errorless Learning (Errorless Teaching, Error-Free Learning)
- Errorless learning is a teaching methodology that structures tasks so that learners are guided toward correct responses and prevented from making mistakes during the learning process. In accessible te…
- Evocation (Word Association Strength, Semantic Evocation)
- A measure of how strongly one word brings another word to mind, reflecting the associative connections between concepts in human semantic memory. Unlike formal semantic relationships such as synonymy …
- Executive Function (Executive Functioning, Cognitive Control, Executive Control)
- A set of cognitive processes that enable goal-directed behavior, including planning, working memory, attention, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility. Executive functions allow individuals to …