Literature Reviews

Reviewed research papers, articles, and publications relevant to digital accessibility.

• Before the Technological Fix: Scoping AI and AAC for Social Futures

  Seray B Ibrahim, Tom Griffiths, Michael Clarke, Simon Judge, Petr Slovak, Graham Pullin, Jeff Higginbotham (2026) — Extended Abstracts of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA '26)

  Ibrahim and colleagues - a multi-institution team of researchers working at the intersection of AAC, HCI, and disability studies - argue that the recent surge of HCI work applying AI to Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) is drifting awa…

  • AAC
  • augmentative and alternative communication
  • artificial intelligence
  • scoping review
  • social interaction
  • accessibility theory
  • critical disability studies

• Mapping Movies: A Mind-Map Approach to Aphasia-Friendly Video

  Shayan Bali, Alexandre Nevsky, Filip Bircanin, Timothy Neate (2026) — Extended Abstracts of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA '26)

  Bali, Nevsky, Bircanin, and Neate (King's College London) target an under-served corner of media accessibility: viewers with aphasia and other complex communication needs (CCNs) for whom subtitles, audio description, and existing simplified-media int…

  • aphasia
  • complex communication needs
  • video accessibility
  • cognitive accessibility
  • mind maps
  • artificial intelligence
  • media accessibility
  • text-to-speech
  • visualisation

• The Perceptual Gap: Why We Need Accessible XAI for Assistive Technologies

  Shadab H. Choudhury (2026) — Extended Abstracts of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA '26)

  Choudhury (University of Maryland, Baltimore County) presents a position paper and targeted literature review arguing that explainable AI (XAI) — the body of methods that help users understand why a black-box model produced a particular output — is f…

  • explainable AI
  • XAI
  • artificial intelligence
  • blind and low vision
  • deaf and hard of hearing
  • assistive technology
  • human-centered AI
  • accessibility research
  • AI accessibility
  • position paper

• AI4XR: AI in Extended Reality for 3D Scene Editing and Accessibility Design

  Junlong Chen (2026) — Extended Abstracts of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA '26) — Doctoral Consortium

  This CHI '26 Doctoral Consortium paper summarises Junlong Chen's PhD research at the University of Cambridge on integrating AI — specifically large language models (LLMs) and vision-language models (VLMs) — into extended reality (XR) workflows. The r…

  • extended reality
  • virtual reality
  • artificial intelligence
  • large language models
  • vision-language models
  • visual accessibility
  • blind and low vision
  • scene description
  • multimodal interaction
  • doctoral consortium

• Exploring AI Opportunities in Deaf Education: Understanding Design Needs Through Teacher and Parent Perspectives in Bangladesh

  Md. Ataur Rahman Bhuiyan, Nadim Mahmud Dipu, Tanvir Rahman, Oindri Aurunima Sarker, Shidhartha Chakrabarty Turzo, Jannatun Noor (2026) — Proceedings of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '26)

  This CHI 2026 qualitative study investigates how AI-powered educational tools should be designed for Deaf learners in Bangladesh — a low-resource context where Bangla Sign Language (BdSL) is still evolving, datasets are small, and infrastructure (int…

  • deaf education
  • sign language
  • Bangla Sign Language
  • BdSL
  • artificial intelligence
  • large language models
  • accessibility
  • co-design
  • Global South
  • educational technology
  • low-resource setting
  • Bangladesh
  • qualitative research
  • disability justice

• "Computer Says No": Disabled Welfare Experiences and Envisioned Futures Under AI Governance

  Humphrey Curtis, Adam D G Jenkins, Alistair Gentry, Sioban Zacharek, Sally McVicker, Timothy Neate, Filip Bircanin (2026) — Proceedings of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '26)

  Curtis and colleagues investigate how people with aphasia — a language impairment most often caused by stroke that affects reading, writing, speech, and comprehension — experience the increasingly digitised and AI-automated UK welfare state, and how …

  • AI
  • artificial intelligence
  • AI governance
  • algorithmic decision-making
  • aphasia
  • welfare
  • digital exclusion
  • participatory design
  • design fiction
  • disability rights
  • critical HCI
  • government services
  • hostile design
  • communication disability

• Synergy of Artificial Intelligence and Extended Reality in Patient-focused Health and Well-Being Applications—A Systematic Review

  Tim Schwirtlich, Cheolmin Matthew Lee, Molly Beestrum, David C. Mohr (2026) — ACM Transactions on Computing for Healthcare

  This systematic review, conducted by researchers at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, maps the landscape of applications that combine artificial intelligence and extended reality (XR) for direct patient health and well-being outc…

  • extended reality
  • artificial intelligence
  • rehabilitation
  • mental health
  • accessibility
  • systematic review
  • machine learning
  • conversational AI
  • healthcare
  • telehealth
  • human-computer interaction

• Rhetoric vs Responsibility: How Tech Companies Shape AI for Accessibility

  Aparajita S Marathe, Quan Zhou, Achi Mishra, Anne Marie Piper (2026) — Proceedings of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '26)

  Marathe, Zhou, Mishra, and Piper conduct a critical discourse analysis (CDA) of 126 public-facing blog posts and news articles published between 2016 and 2025 by 11 leading U.S.-based AI companies — Adobe, Amazon, Apple, Eleven Labs, Google, Meta, Mi…

  • artificial intelligence
  • AI accessibility
  • critical discourse analysis
  • disability justice
  • critical disability studies
  • technoableism
  • corporate rhetoric
  • AI ethics
  • participatory design
  • disability representation
  • ethics washing

• Planning, Reasoning, and Agents for Non-Visual Navigation of Tables and Frames

  Enrico Pontelli, Tran Cao Son (2002) — Proceedings of the Fifth International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies (Assets 02)

  This paper from New Mexico State University extends previous work on a Domain Specific Language (DSL) for non-visual table navigation by reinterpreting it within the framework of formal action theory. The core problem addressed is that HTML tables an…

  • table accessibility
  • screen readers
  • non-visual navigation
  • semantic navigation
  • artificial intelligence
  • domain specific language
  • HTML tables

• Morae: Proactively Pausing UI Agents for User Choices

  Yi-Hao Peng, Dingzeyu Li, Jeffrey P. Bigham, Amy Pavel (2025) — Proceedings of the 38th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST '25)

  This paper introduces Morae, a UI agent that proactively pauses during automated task execution to involve blind and low-vision (BLV) users in critical decisions, rather than completing tasks end-to-end without user input. The work is motivated by a …

  • UI agents
  • blind and low vision
  • large language models
  • human-agent interaction
  • user agency
  • mixed-initiative interaction
  • web accessibility
  • screen readers
  • artificial intelligence