Exploring User Preferences on eText Interface Design to Support Reading Among Low Vision Elders

Accessibility and usability are two important concepts for universal design but have been given less emphasis by most developers especially when developing web interfaces. Among the affected users are the elderly people who are facing difficulties interacting with the computer devices as the interface could not fully support the changes in their sensorial, motor and cognitive abilities. The objective of this study is to elicit elderly readers’ opinions on the interface of eText in order to support their reading. It discovers elderly people preferences on the background and font color on the interface for reading. The study is motivated by reported work claiming that these two interface elements could support the elders in reading. Through an interview, a suitable contrast color of background and text was determined. The findings were used to design an e-text interface and tested with elderly people. The study findings could help designers to better design e-text interface for elderly readers.