Literature Reviews

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

• Real-Time Captioning by Non-Experts with Legion Scribe

  Walter S. Lasecki, Christopher D. Miller, Raja Kushalnagar, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2013) — Proceedings of the 15th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2013)

  This short paper introduces Legion Scribe (Scribe), a system that enables 3-5 non-expert typists to collectively caption speech in real time, achieving accuracy approaching that of a professional stenographer at 20-30% of the cost. The system address…

  • real-time captioning
  • deaf and hard of hearing
  • crowdsourcing
  • human computation
  • assistive technology
  • captioning

• Accessible Crowdwork? Understanding the Value in and Challenge of Microtask Employment for People with Disabilities

  Kathryn Zyskowski, Meredith Ringel Morris, Jeffrey P. Bigham, Mary L. Gray, Shaun K. Kane (2015) — Proceedings of the 18th ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (CSCW 2015)

  This paper presents the first formal study of crowdworkers who have disabilities, using a mixed-methods approach combining in-depth interviews with 17 people (8 disabled crowdworkers and 9 job coaches for people with disabilities) and a survey of 631…

  • crowdsourcing
  • disability employment
  • workplace accessibility
  • digital inclusion
  • assistive technology
  • accessibility barriers
  • Mechanical Turk
  • disability rights

• WearMail: On-the-Go Access to Information in Your Email with a Privacy-Preserving Human Computation Workflow

  Saiganesh Swaminathan, Raymond Fok, Fanglin Chen, Ting-Hao (Kenneth) Huang, Irene Lin, Rohan Jadvani, Walter S. Lasecki, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2017) — Proceedings of the 30th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST 2017)

  WearMail is a conversational system that extracts specific information from a user's email via voice queries on wearable devices (such as smartwatches), using a novel privacy-preserving human computation workflow. The system addresses the challenge t…

  • crowdsourcing
  • human computation
  • privacy
  • wearable technology
  • information extraction
  • mobile accessibility
  • conversational interface

• Scribe: Deep Integration of Human and Machine Intelligence to Caption Speech in Real Time

  Walter S. Lasecki, Christopher D. Miller, Iftekhar Naim, Raja Kushalnagar, Adam Sadilek, Daniel Gildea, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2017) — Communications of the ACM

  Scribe is a system that provides on-demand, real-time captioning of live speech for deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) people by combining groups of non-expert human captionists with machine intelligence. The system addresses a critical accessibility gap…

  • real-time captioning
  • deaf and hard of hearing
  • crowdsourcing
  • human computation
  • speech recognition
  • assistive technology
  • captioning

• Zensors: Adaptive, Rapidly Deployable, Human-Intelligent Sensor Feeds

  Gierad Laput, Walter S. Lasecki, Jason Wiese, Robert Xiao, Jeffrey P. Bigham, Chris Harrison (2015) — Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2015)

  Zensors presents a novel sensing platform that combines real-time human intelligence from online crowd workers with machine learning to create adaptive, rapidly deployable intelligent sensors. The system addresses a fundamental gap in smart environme…

  • crowdsourcing
  • human computation
  • computer vision
  • smart environments
  • machine learning
  • assistive technology
  • sensor systems

• Investigating the Appropriateness of Social Network Question Asking as a Resource for Blind Users

  Erin L. Brady, Yu Zhong, Meredith Ringel Morris, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2013) — Proceedings of the 2013 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW 2013)

  This paper explores whether social networking sites (SNSs) are a viable alternative to paid crowdsourcing for answering blind users' visual questions. The research combines three methods: a survey of 191 blind adults about their social networking hab…

  • social media accessibility
  • blind users
  • crowdsourcing
  • friendsourcing
  • visual question answering
  • social costs

• VizLens: A Robust and Interactive Screen Reader for Interfaces in the Real World

  Anhong Guo, Xiang "Anthony" Chen, Haoran Qi, Samuel White, Suman Ghosh, Chieko Asakawa, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2016) — Proceedings of the 29th Annual Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST 2016)

  This paper introduces VizLens, a system that functions as a screen reader for physical interfaces in the real world, enabling blind people to independently use inaccessible appliances like microwaves, thermostats, kiosks, and checkout terminals. VizL…

  • visual accessibility
  • computer vision
  • crowdsourcing
  • blind users
  • physical interfaces
  • screen reader
  • assistive technology

• The Design of Human-Powered Access Technology

  Jeffrey P. Bigham, Richard E. Ladner, Yevgen Borodin (2011) — Proceedings of the 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2011)

  This paper presents a comprehensive framework of 13 design dimensions for evaluating and comparing human-powered access technology — systems that use human assistance, facilitated by technology, to overcome accessibility barriers that automation alon…

  • human computation
  • crowdsourcing
  • assistive technology
  • accessibility framework
  • design principles

• Facade: Auto-generating Tactile Interfaces to Appliances

  Anhong Guo, Jeeeun Kim, Xiang "Anthony" Chen, Tom Yeh, Scott E. Hudson, Jennifer Mankoff, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2017) — Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2017)

  This paper introduces Facade, a crowdsourced fabrication pipeline that enables blind people to independently make flat-panel appliance interfaces accessible by generating 3D-printed tactile button overlays. The problem addressed is that modern applia…

  • 3D printing
  • tactile interface
  • blind users
  • crowdsourcing
  • fabrication
  • appliance accessibility
  • assistive technology

• A Readability Evaluation of Real-Time Crowd Captions in the Classroom

  Raja S. Kushalnagar, Walter S. Lasecki, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2012) — Proceedings of the 14th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2012)

  This paper evaluates the readability of real-time captions produced by three different approaches in a higher education classroom setting: professional CART (Communication Access Realtime Translation) captionists, automatic speech recognition (ASR), …

  • real-time captioning
  • deaf and hard of hearing
  • crowdsourcing
  • classroom accessibility
  • higher education
  • speech recognition