computer-based forms, they are not necessarily
limited to online/web forms.
Difficulties interacting with list-boxes give rise
to several design concerns. If checkboxes and radio-
buttons are to be used with elderly people rather than
list-boxes, a larger number of options will be
rendered visible. As a consequence, the size of
online forms might grow considerably (e.g.; the
“country” field would demand the display of a huge
number of options, the countries). This might lead to
other accessibility issues, such as visual clustering, a
larger number of pages and scroll.
The results presented in this paper might also
contribute to current web guidelines or patterns for
the elderly, which have briefly been reviewed in the
first section of the paper, in addition to being used in
recent developments aiming at automatic
personalization of online forms for the elderly, such
as the DIADEM EU funded project (Lines et al.,
2006).
5.2 Limitations and Outlook
Web Accessibility with the elderly is a new and
growing research area and there are many
unanswered questions.
Our results are based on a small number of young
elderly people. Nevertheless, due to the fact that
aging is a very complex and heterogeneous process,
a larger number of elderly people with different
profiles and nationalities should be contemplated in
future studies. Working towards inclusive design,
comparisons with young and disabled people; more
complex online forms and quantitative analysis (e.g.;
time to carry out tasks) are worthy of attention in
order to pinpoint the effects of age and disabilities
on designing accessible online forms.
This study has focused on the mouse as the only
input device used by elderly people. However, they
might interact with online forms through alternative
input devices or assistive technologies, which could
be used together. Future studies might consider the
impact of input devices on the design of online
forms for the elderly.
Further studies are also needed in order to
evaluate the usability of more widgets with older
people, such as multiple list-boxes,.
We expect to address all these issues within the
context of our ongoing PhD research, which is
focused on ICT-based communication tools and
usability methods with the young elderly.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We would like to thank the Molins de Rei city
council and the Casal 1er de Maig (old-age
pensioner association) for their collaboration and
support. We also want to thank the reviewers for
their comments.
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