Glossary
Searchable terminology from accessibility, web standards, and related fields.
39 results found in Design Methodology.
- Age-Sensitive Design (Age-Sensitive Creative AI Mediation)
- A design stance that treats age-related physical, cognitive, and digital-literacy characteristics as first-class inputs to the system design process rather than as edge cases to be handled after the f…
- Capability Sensitive Design
- A design approach, proposed by Ilse Oosterlaken, that takes human diversity morally seriously and evaluates technologies by how they actually expand or constrain the real opportunities (capabilities) …
- Cross-Cultural Design (Culturally Responsive Design, Culture-Sensitive Design)
- An approach to designing products, services, and technologies that accounts for the cultural contexts, values, norms, and practices of diverse user populations. In accessibility, cross-cultural design…
- Design Exclusion (Exclusion Audit, Technology Exclusion)
- The process by which certain users are prevented from effectively using a product or service due to mismatches between the design of the technology and their abilities, circumstances, or available res…
- Design Informant (Informant Design)
- A participatory design role in which users contribute to the design process by providing input, preferences, and feedback, but the researcher retains responsibility for interpreting this data and maki…
- Design Pattern (Interaction Pattern, Pattern of Assistive Interaction)
- A reusable, generalised description of a solution to a commonly recurring design problem, expressed in a way that can be applied across different contexts without prescribing a specific implementation…
- Design Sprint (Google Design Sprint)
- A structured, time-constrained design methodology originally developed at Google Ventures that guides teams through five phases — Map, Sketch, Decide, Prototype, and Test — to rapidly solve design pro…
- Design for Dynamic Diversity (D3, DDD)
- A design paradigm proposed by Gregor, Newell, and Zajicek (2002) that explicitly accounts for the fact that human abilities are not static but change dynamically over time, particularly as people age.…
- Desire Paths (Desire lines)
- A term from urban design describing the unofficial trails that pedestrians wear into grass or dirt when built sidewalks do not meet their needs - the visible trace of an infrastructure users have impr…
- Disability Interaction (DIX)
- A challenge-based approach and manifesto for creating a more inclusive world where disability can be an inspiration for innovation and creativity, and where inclusion is the norm. Proposed by Catherin…
- Disability-Related Embodied Empathy from Existing Media (DREEM)
- A design pedagogy approach, introduced by Baltaxe-Admony et al., that does not translate specific aspects of disability theory into technology requirements but instead develops curricula that sensitis…
- Empathy Tools (Empathy Aids, Empathy-building Tools, Age Suits)
- Empathy tools are physical or digital artefacts designed to give non-disabled designers a limited first-hand experience of specific impairments or ageing effects — cataract-simulating goggles, blurrin…
- Empathy in Design (Design Empathy, Empathic Design)
- Empathy in design refers to the ability and practice of understanding and sharing the feelings, perspectives, and experiences of the people who will use a product or service. In accessibility contexts…
- Future Workshop
- A participatory research method developed by Jungk and Mullert in 1987 that supports collective reflection and idea generation about possible futures. A Future Workshop typically unfolds in phases: cr…
- HAAT Model (Human Activity Assistive Technology Model)
- A conceptual framework for understanding and designing assistive technology systems that identifies four interconnected components: the human user, the activity being performed, the assistive technolo…
- Heuristic Evaluation (Expert Review, Heuristic Review)
- An accessibility or usability evaluation method in which evaluators examine an interface against a set of recognised principles (heuristics) to identify potential problems. In web accessibility, heuri…
- Human Factors Engineering (Ergonomics, Human Factors)
- The scientific discipline concerned with designing systems, products, and environments to be compatible with the physical and cognitive capabilities and limitations of the people who use them. In acce…
- ISO 9241-210 (Human-Centred Design Standard, Ergonomics of Human-System Interaction — Part 210)
- An international standard specifying the principles and activities of human-centred design (HCD) for interactive systems. It defines a six-step iterative process — understanding context of use, specif…
- Infrastructuring
- A theoretical lens from HCI, CSCW, and participatory design (developed from the work of Susan Leigh Star, Karen Ruhleder, Volkmar Pipek, and Volker Wulf) that treats infrastructure not as a finished a…
- Infrastructuring for Access
- A design approach introduced by Wang and Marie (CHI 2026) that combines HCI's infrastructuring theory with Disability Studies and Repair Studies. Rather than focusing on removing barriers or accommoda…