Compilation and evaluation of guidelines regarding the design of websites for elderly

Jakob Jönsson

Madeleine Kazemi

Abstract

The main purpose of the study was to compile and evaluate existing guidelines regarding the design of websites taking into consideration the elderly's physical impairments. The study is limited to the guidelines on aspects related to legibility and navigation. The limitation was aimed at studying the physical aspects relating to the design of websites.

The first part of the study consisted of reading earlier research regarding guidelines for the elderly and compiling those in which there was consensus. The second part evaluated the guidelines by using different types of user tests. When the second part of the study began, certain problems arose in testing the elderly subjects due to social aspects. For this reason the former limitation was abandoned. Because of these problems, further investigating was done using additional user tests - intended to examine what needs to be done differently while working with this target group.

This study shows the HCI area's width. It is not possible to limit a study to only the physical aspects - the social aspects quickly make themselves apparent.