Literature Reviews

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

• Emotionally Oriented Analysis of the Experiences of Visually Impaired People on Facebook

  Cristiane N. Nobre, Magali R. G. Meireles, Débora B. F. Da Silva, Alberto H. Faria, Niltom Vieira (2018) — ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing (TACCESS)

  This paper investigates the emotional experiences of visually impaired Facebook users compared to sighted users, using the PANAS (Positive and Negative Affect Schedule) psychological instrument. The research addresses a gap in accessibility literatur…

  • blindness
  • low vision
  • social media accessibility
  • Facebook
  • emotional design
  • user experience
  • PANAS
  • social inclusion

• Augment browsing and standard profiling for enhancing web accessibility

  Silvia Mirri, Paola Salomoni, Catia Prandi (2011) — Proceedings of the International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper presents GAPforAPE (GreaseMonkey And Profiling for Accessible Pages Enhancement), a client-side system that automatically transcodes web content to meet individual users' accessibility needs and preferences. The system is built as a Firefo…

  • content transcoding
  • user profiling
  • browser extensions
  • social media accessibility
  • personalization
  • client-side adaptation
  • screen readers
  • low vision

• Intelligent Assistive Communication and the Web as a Social Medium

  Karl Wiegand (2014) — Proceedings of the 11th Web for All Conference (W4A)

  This short paper presents doctoral research on applying natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning to improve augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) systems, with a particular focus on enabling web-based social interaction for p…

  • augmentative and alternative communication
  • AAC
  • natural language processing
  • machine learning
  • social media accessibility
  • brain-computer interface
  • speech impairment
  • icon-based communication

• Technology, Education and Access: A "Fair Go" for People with Disabilities

  Scott Hollier (2017) — Proceedings of the 14th International Web for All Conference (W4A)

  This keynote is a personal narrative by Dr. Scott Hollier, a digital access specialist diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa at age five, tracing how technology and education have shaped his life and career in accessibility. Hollier frames the talk aro…

  • lived experience
  • visual impairment
  • retinitis pigmentosa
  • assistive technology
  • consumer technology
  • social media accessibility
  • Internet of Things
  • digital assistants
  • WCAG
  • W3C
  • disability rights
  • Australia
  • autoethnography
  • smartphone accessibility
  • inclusive design

• X-Ray: Screenshot Accessibility via Embedded Metadata

  Sujeath Pareddy, Anhong Guo, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2019) — Proceedings of the 21st International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2019)

  This paper introduces X-Ray, a system that preserves the accessibility of user interface content when it is captured as a screenshot. Screenshots strip away all semantic information — text structure, element roles, states, labels, and navigation orde…

  • screen readers
  • alternative text
  • screenshots
  • image accessibility
  • metadata
  • document accessibility
  • visual impairment
  • social media accessibility

• Supporting Selfie Editing Experiences for People with Visual Impairments

  Soobin Park (2020) — Proceedings of the 22nd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This short paper investigates the selfie editing experiences and desires of people with visual impairments (PVI), a topic largely overlooked despite research showing that PVI actively participate in social media and photo sharing. The study has two p…

  • visual impairment
  • social media accessibility
  • photo editing
  • voice interface
  • blindness
  • augmented reality
  • mobile accessibility

• Authoring accessible media content on social networks

  Letícia Seixas Pereira, José Coelho, André Rodrigues, João Guerreiro, Tiago Guerreiro, Carlos Duarte (2022) — Proceedings of the 24th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '22)

  This paper investigates why user-generated visual content on social media remains overwhelmingly inaccessible to blind and visually impaired users, despite platforms offering tools to add alternative descriptions. The researchers conducted a two-phas…

  • social media accessibility
  • alt text
  • user-generated content
  • image descriptions
  • digital inclusion
  • content authoring

• Understanding Social and Environmental Factors to Enable Collective Access Approaches to the Design of Captioning Technology

  Emma McDonnell (2022) — Proceedings of the 24th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '22)

  This doctoral consortium paper presents a dissertation research program that reimagines how captioning technology should be designed by applying the disability justice principle of collective access — the idea that accessibility is a shared responsib…

  • captioning
  • collective access
  • disability justice
  • deaf and hard of hearing
  • co-design
  • social accessibility
  • automatic speech recognition
  • social media accessibility

• Crippin' WhatsApp's Interaction Design: Learnings from the blind/visually impaired users of India

  Hrittika Bhowmick, Atharva Shrivastava, Sandeep Ysp, Shilpaa Anand, Dipanjan Chakraborty (2025) — Proceedings of the 27th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2025)

  This paper examines how blind and visually impaired users in India navigate WhatsApp, using critical disability studies and Roland Barthes' concept of myth to argue that WhatsApp's design naturalizes visual interaction as universal while marginalizin…

  • screen readers
  • blind users
  • social media accessibility
  • Global South accessibility
  • critical disability studies
  • mobile accessibility
  • interaction design
  • digital divide

• SMART-TBI: Design and Evaluation of the Social Media Accessibility and Rehabilitation Toolkit for Users with Traumatic Brain Injury

  Yaxin Hu, Hajin Lim, Lisa Kakonge, Jade T. Mitchell, Hailey L. Johnson, Lyn S. Turkstra, Melissa C. Duff, Catalina L. Toma, Bilge Mutlu (2024) — ASSETS '24: Proceedings of the 26th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility

  This paper introduces SMART-TBI (Social Media Accessibility and Rehabilitation Toolkit), a browser extension designed to make Facebook more accessible for people with traumatic brain injury (TBI). TBI can cause a range of cognitive and communication …

  • traumatic brain injury
  • social media accessibility
  • cognitive accessibility
  • Facebook
  • AI-assisted communication
  • rehabilitation
  • browser extension
  • social participation