nach oben

Universal Access in the Information Society

Erschienen in:

15.04.2020 | Long Paper

Evaluating the accessibility of higher education institution websites in the State of Kuwait: empirical evidence

verfasst von: Zainab AlMeraj, Fatima Boujarwah, Dari Alhuwail, Rumana Qadri

Erschienen in: Universal Access in the Information Society | Ausgabe 1/2021

Einloggen

Aktivieren Sie unsere intelligente Suche, um passende Fachinhalte oder Patente zu finden.

search-config

KI-gestützte Suche

Aus

Abstract

The objective of this study is to evaluate the current state of accessibility of higher education institution websites in the State of Kuwait. Using a quantitative approach, websites of higher education institutions were evaluated for their conformance to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.0) standard. A total of 41 higher education homepages and college landing pages were evaluated. The following software conformance tools and metrics were used: AChecker, Total Validator, WAVE and HTML/CSS/ARIA. The evaluation was followed by a systematic analysis of the results, a comparison to other areas of accessibility research, and putting forth a set of recommendations for the improvement in higher education website accessibility. None of the higher education websites fully conformed to the WCAG 2.0 Level A standard across all tools used. The lowest ranking pages (24% of all pages) had an error rate above 35% across all aspects of the WCAG 2.0 guidelines. The majority of errors, at both WCAG 2.0 levels A and AA, fell under the perceivable criteria. Overall, the analysis suggested that accessibility was not accounted for during the website development and that careful re-design and repair of current issues should be a top priority. There is an urgent need to solve accessibility violations in higher education institution websites in Kuwait to support people with disabilities. Educational institutions should develop and enforce policies and laws as well as increase awareness of the WCAG standard amongst IT managers and developers. The institutions should also invest in their developers’ accessibility training and research as well as account for routine reviews of their web pages by people with disabilities and experts.

Vorheriger Artikel Disability digital divide: the use of the internet, smartphones, computers and tablets among people with disabilities in Sweden

Nächster Artikel Accessibility, usability, and security evaluation of Hungarian government websites

Sie haben noch keine Lizenz? Dann Informieren Sie sich jetzt über unsere Produkte:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

Jetzt informieren

Springer Professional "Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 390 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

Jetzt informieren

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

Jetzt informieren

Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman.

A comprehensive list of the Web evaluation accessibility tools can be found at https://www.w3.org/WAI/ER/tools/.

https://validator.w3.org/.

https://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/.

Abu Doush, I., Alhami, I.: Evaluating the accessibility of computer laboratories, libraries, and websites in Jordanian Universities and Colleges. Int. J. Inf. Syst. Soc. Change 9(2), 44–60 (2018). https://doi.org/10.4018/IJISSC.2018040104CrossRef

AChecker: ATRC web accessibility checker. http://achecker.ca/checker/index.php. Accessed 19 May 2018

Acosta-Vargas, P., Luján-Mora, S., Acosta, T., Salvador-Ullauri, L.: Toward a combined method for evaluation of web accessibility. In: Rocha, Á., Guarda, T. (eds.) Proceedings of the International Conference on Information Technology and Systems (ICITS 2018), pp. 602–613. Springer, Cham (2018)

Acosta-Vargas, P., Luján-Mora, S., Salvador-Ullauri, L.: Evaluation of the web accessibility of higher-education websites. In: 2016 15th International Conference on Information Technology Based Higher Education and Training (ITHET), pp. 1–6 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1109/ITHET.2016.7760703

Acosta-Vargas, P., Acosta, T., Luján-Mora, S.: Challenges to assess accessibility in higher education websites: a comparative study of Latin America Universities. IEEE Access 6, 36500–36508 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2018.2848978CrossRef

Aguillo, I.F., Ortega, J.L., Fernndez, M.: Webometric ranking of world universities: introduction, methodology, and future developments. High. Educ. Europe 33(2–3), 233–244 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1080/03797720802254031CrossRef

Ahmi, A., Mohamad, R.: Evaluating accessibility of malaysian public universities websites using achecker and wave. J. Inf. Commun. Technol. 15, 193–214 (2016)

Akgul, Y., Vatansever, K.: Web accessibility evaluation of government websites for people with disabilities in Turkey. J. Adv. Manag. Sci. (2016). https://doi.org/10.12720/joams.4.3.201-210CrossRef

Akram, M., Sulaiman, R.B.: A systematic literature review to determine the web accessibility issues in Saudi Arabian university and government websites for disable people. Int. J. Adv. Comput. Sci. Appl. (2017). https://doi.org/10.14569/IJACSA.2017.080642CrossRef

10.

Alahmadi, T., Drew, S.: Accessibility evaluation of top-ranking university websites in world, Oceania, and Arab categories for home, admission, and course description webpages. J. Open Flex. Distance Learn. 21(1), 7–24 (2017)

11.

Alayed, A., Wald, M., Draffan, E.A.: Challenges to enhancing web accessibility in Saudi university websites: an exploratory study. In: The Fourth International Conference on Building and Exploring Web Based Environments, pp. 6–9 (2016)

12.

Alhuwail, D., AlMeraj, Z., Boujarwah, F.: Evaluating hospital websites in Kuwait to improve consumer engagement and access to health information: a cross-sectional analytical study. BMC Med. Inform. Decis. Mak. (2018). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12911-018-0660-4CrossRef

13.

Ali, L., Ali, F., Surendran, P., Thomas, B.: Information systems accessibility of educational websites in the Kingdom of Bahrain. Int. J. Inf. Educ. Technol. 7, 728–732 (2017). https://doi.org/10.18178/ijiet.2017.7.10.962CrossRef

14.

Al-Khalifa, H.S.: The accessibility of saudi arabia government web sites: an exploratory study. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 11(2), 201–210 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-010-0215-7CrossRef

15.

Al-Khalifa, H.S., Baazeem, I., Alamer, R.: Revisiting the accessibility of saudi arabia government websites. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 16(4), 1027–1039 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-016-0495-7CrossRef

16.

Alshamari, M.: Accessibility evaluation of arabic e-commerce web sites using automated tools. J. Softw. Eng. Appl. 9(9), 439–451 (2016). https://doi.org/10.4236/jsea.2016.99029CrossRef

17.

Burke, P.J.: The Right to Higher Education: Beyond Widening Participation, 1st edn. Routledge, London (2012)

18.

Contrast Checker (2019). https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

19.

Duplaga, M.: Digital divide among people with disabilities: analysis of data from a nationwide study for determinants of internet use and activities performed online. PLoS ONE 12(6), e0179825 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0179825CrossRef

20.

Gonçalves, R., Rocha, T., Martins, J., Branco, F., Au-Yong-Oliveira, M.: Evaluation of e-commerce websites accessibility and usability: an e-commerce platform analysis with the inclusion of blind users. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 17(3), 567–583 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-017-0557-5CrossRef

21.

Goodwin, M., Susar, D., Nietzio, A., Snaprud, M., Jensen, C.S.: Global web accessibility analysis of national government portals and ministry web sites. J. Inf. Technol. Politics 8(1), 41–67 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1080/19331681.2010.508011CrossRef

22.

Huerta, T.R., Hefner, J.L., Ford, E.W., McAlearney, A.S., Menachemi, N.: Hospital website rankings in the United States: expanding benchmarks and standards for effective consumer engagement. J. Med. Internet Res. 16(2), e64 (2014)CrossRef

23.

İşeri, Eİ., Uyar, K., İlhan, Ü.: The accessibility of Cyprus Islands higher education institution websites. Procedia Comput. Sci. 120, 967–974 (2017)CrossRef

24.

Ismail, A., Kuppusamy, K.: Accessibility of Indian universities homepages: an exploratory study. J. King Saud Univ. Comput. Inf. Sci. 30(2), 268–278 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jksuci.2016.06.006CrossRef

25.

Ismailova, R., Inal, Y.: Accessibility evaluation of top university websites: a comparative study of Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkey. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 17(2), 437–445 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-017-0541-0CrossRef

26.

Kamal, I.W., Wahsheh, H.A., Alsmadi, I.M., Al-Kabi, M.N.: Evaluating web accessibility metrics for Jordanian universities. Int. J. Adv. Comput. Sci. Appl. (2016). https://doi.org/10.14569/IJACSA.2016.070716CrossRef

27.

Kamoun, F., Almourad, M.B.: Accessibility as an integral factor in e-government web site evaluation: the case of Dubai e-government. Inf. Technol. People 27(2), 208–228 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1108/ITP-07-2013-0130CrossRef

28.

Kesswani, N., Kumar, S.: Accessibility analysis of websites of educational institutions. Perspect. Sci. 8, 210–212 (2016)CrossRef

29.

Kurt, S.: Moving toward a universally accessible web: web accessibility and education. Assist. Technol. 31(4), 199–208 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1080/10400435.2017.1414086CrossRef

30.

Lazar, J., Dudley-Sponaugle, A., Greenidge, K.D.: Improving web accessibility: a study of webmaster perceptions. Comput. Hum. Behav. 20(2), 269–288 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2003.10.018CrossRef

31.

Lazar, J., Allen, A., Kleinman, J., Malarkey, C.: What frustrates screen reader users on the web: a study of 100 blind users. Int. J. Hum. Comput. Interact. 22(3), 247–269 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1080/10447310709336964CrossRef

32.

Lee, K.: Rethinking the accessibility of online higher education: a historical view. Internet High. Educ. 33, 15–23 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2017.01.001CrossRef

33.

Leitner, M.L., Strauss, C., Stummer, C.: Web accessibility implementation in private sector organizations: motivations and business impact. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 15(2), 249–260 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-014-0380-1CrossRef

34.

Liu, Y.Q., Bielefield, A., McKay, P.: Are urban public libraries websites accessible to Americans with disabilities? Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 18(1), 191–206 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-017-0571-7CrossRef

35.

Manzoor, M., Hussain, W., Ahmed, A., Iqbal, M.J.: The importance of higher education website and its usability. Int. J. Basic Appl. Sci. 1(2), 150–163 (2012). https://doi.org/10.14419/ijbas.v1i2.73CrossRef

36.

Moreno, L., Martinez, P.: Overlapping factors in search engine optimization and web accessibility. Online Inf. Rev. 37(4), 564–580 (2013). Acessed 11 Apr 2020CrossRef

37.

Mulloy, A.M., Gevarter, C., Hopkins, M., Sutherland, K.S., Ramdoss, S.T.: Assistive technology for students with visual impairments and blindness. In: Assistive Technologies for People with Diverse Abilities, pp. 113–156. Springer (2014)

38.

Nations, U.: Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (2006). https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/resources/general-assembly/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities-ares61106.html

39.

Sandhu, A.K.: Foregrounding accessibility for user experience design. Ph.D. thesis, University of Texas (2015)

40.

Shawar, B.A.: Evaluating web accessibility of educational websites. Int. J. Emerg. Technol. Learn. 10(4), 4–10 (2015)CrossRef

41.

Solovieva, T.I., Bock, J.M.: Monitoring for accessibility and university websites: meeting the needs of people with disabilities. J. Postsecond. Educ. Disabil. 27(2), 113–127 (2014)

42.

Spinczyk, D., Makowski, M., Kempa, W., Rojewska, K.: Factors influencing the process of learning mathematics among visually impaired and blind people. Comput. Biol. Med. 104, 1–9 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compbiomed.2018.10.025CrossRef

43.

Tashtoush, Y.M., Darabseh, A.F., Al-Sarhan, H.N.: The Arabian e-government websites accessibility: a case study. In: 2016 7th International Conference on Information and Communication Systems (ICICS), pp. 276–281 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1109/IACS.2016.7476064

44.

The UN Sustainable Development Goals (2018). https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/?menu=1300

45.

TotalValidator: Total validator. https://www.totalvalidator.com. Accessed 19 May 2018

46.

UNDP-Kuwait: “Kuwait Digital Accessibility Framework” workshop|UNDP in Kuwait (2018). http://www.kw.undp.org/content/kuwait/en/home/presscenter/articles/_kuwait-digital-accessibility-framework-workshop.html. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

47.

UNDP-Kuwait: achieving Kuwait 2035 vision towards persons with disability (2018). http://www.kw.undp.org/content/kuwait/en/home/operations/projects/human_development/achieving-kuwait-2035-vision-towards-persons-with-disability.html. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

48.

U.S. General Services Administration: IT Accessibility Laws and Policies. https://www.section508.gov/manage/laws-and-policies. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

49.

Vigo, M., Brown, J., Conway, V.: Benchmarking web accessibility evaluation tools: measuring the harm of sole reliance on automated tests. In: Proceedings of the 10th International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility, W4A ’13, pp. 1:1–1:10. ACM, New York, NY, USA (2013). https://doi.org/10.1145/2461121.2461124

50.

Vigo, M., Brajnik, G.: Automatic web accessibility metrics: where we are and where we can go. Interact. Comput. 23(2), 137–155 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intcom.2011.01.001. Accessed 11 Apr 2020CrossRef

51.

W3C: World Wide Web consortium (W3C): introduction to web accessibility (WAI) (2018). https://www.w3.org/WAI/fundamentals/accessibility-intro/. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

52.

W3C: World Wide Web Consortium (W3C): Introduction to Web Accessibility. https://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/accessibility.php. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

53.

WAI: Web Accessibility Initiative WAI: Diverse abilities and barriers (2018). https://www.w3.org/WAI/people-use-web/abilities-barriers/. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

54.

WAVE: WAVE Web accessibility tool. http://wave.webaim.org. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

55.

WCAG2.0, W.: Web content accessibility guidelines. https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/. Accessed 11 Apr 2020

56.

Weber, A.S., City, E.: Inclusive education in the gulf cooperation council. J. Educ. Instr. Stud. World 2(2), 85–97 (2012)

Titel: Evaluating the accessibility of higher education institution websites in the State of Kuwait: empirical evidence
verfasst von: Zainab AlMeraj
Fatima Boujarwah
Dari Alhuwail
Rumana Qadri
Publikationsdatum: 15.04.2020
Verlag: Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Erschienen in: Universal Access in the Information Society / Ausgabe 1/2021
Print ISSN: 1615-5289
Elektronische ISSN: 1615-5297
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-020-00717-8

Springer Professional

Abstract

Bitte loggen Sie sich ein, um Zugang zu Ihrer Lizenz zu erhalten.

Sie haben noch keine Lizenz? Dann Informieren Sie sich jetzt über unsere Produkte:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Springer Professional "Technik"

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Weitere Artikel der Ausgabe 1/2021

“Keep it simple!”: an eye-tracking study for exploring complexity and distinguishability of web pages for people with autism

Web accessibility evaluation of top-ranking university Web sites in Spain, Chile and Mexico

The use of the internet by older adults in Poland

Accessibility, usability, quality performance, and readability evaluation of university websites of Turkey: a comparative study of state and private universities

An investigation of the approaches for integrating learning materials and digital games: a prior ability perspective

Braille learning materials for Braille reading novices: experimental determination of dot code printing area for a pen-type interface read aloud function

Premium Partner