Glossary

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AT Impact Framework(also: ATIF, Assistive Technology Impact Framework)

A multi-level conceptual framework for evaluating the impact of assistive technology interventions on quality of life, developed from longitudinal research with smartphone users with sensory disabilities in Kenya. ATIF is structured across three ecological levels: Self…

Accessibility dataset(also: Disability-inclusive dataset, Accessible benchmark)

A publicly available research dataset that includes data collected from people with disabilities, enabling algorithm development and benchmarking on representative populations rather than exclusively on non-disabled participants. Examples include WeAllWalk (inertial data from…

Acquiescence Bias(also: Agreement Bias, Yea-Saying)

A response bias in which participants tend to agree with statements or respond affirmatively regardless of the actual content, often to be accommodating or to avoid conflict with the researcher. In accessibility research, acquiescence bias can be amplified among participants…

Acquiescence Bias(also: Agreement Bias, Yea-Saying)

A type of response bias where survey respondents tend to agree with statements regardless of their actual content. This "yea-saying" tendency can skew research results, particularly in accessibility studies where participants may feel inclined to provide positive feedback.…

Affinity Diagram(also: Affinity Diagramming, KJ Method)

A collaborative analysis method where team members organise large amounts of data — such as user research findings, design ideas, or usability issues — by writing individual items on sticky notes and grouping them on a wall or board according to their natural relationships and…

Agential Realism

A theoretical framework developed by physicist-philosopher Karen Barad that rejects the idea of pre-existing, independent subjects and objects, arguing instead that phenomena emerge through specific "intra-actions" between apparatus and matter. Applied to accessibility research,…

Back-translation(also: Reverse translation)

A validation technique in cross-linguistic instrument translation where an independently translated version (e.g., ASL video) is translated back into the source language (e.g., English) by someone who did not see the original, then compared for meaning equivalence.…

Between-Subjects Design(also: Between-Groups Design, Independent-Groups Design)

A between-subjects design is an experimental research design in which each participant is assigned to only one condition, and the conditions are compared across different groups of people. It contrasts with within-subjects (repeated-measures) designs, in which every participant…

Bibliometric analysis(also: Bibliometrics, Scientometrics)

The quantitative study of scientific literature using statistical methods to analyse publication patterns, citation networks, authorship trends, and research impact. In accessibility research, bibliometric analysis has been used to map the evolution of the field, identify key…

Bibliometrics(also: Bibliometric Analysis, Science Mapping)

Bibliometrics is the quantitative analysis of published research literature, including citation patterns, authorship networks, keyword frequencies, and publication trends. In accessibility research, bibliometric methods help identify research gaps, map the evolution of topics…

Big Five Personality Traits(also: Big Five, Five-Factor Model, OCEAN Model)

A widely used psychological model that describes human personality along five trait dimensions: Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism. Originally developed in personality psychology, it has been adopted in human-robot interaction…

Boundary Object

A concept introduced by Star and Griesemer (1989) for artefacts, documents, or concepts that are flexible enough to be used across different communities of practice while retaining a recognisable identity in each. Boundary objects let disabled people, designers, researchers,…

Capacity Building(also: Research Capacity Building, Capability Development)

The process of developing and strengthening the skills, resources, and infrastructure that enable individuals, communities, and organizations to carry out research, develop technologies, and advocate for their needs effectively. In accessibility, capacity building involves…

Codebook (Research)(also: Coding Manual, Qualitative Codebook)

A codebook is a structured set of codes, definitions, and application rules used to systematically analyse qualitative data (interview transcripts, observation notes, documents) or to extract data from literature for review work. It typically specifies each code's name,…

Community-Driven Research(also: Community-Based Research, Community-Led Research)

A research approach where the community being studied plays a central role in defining research questions, designing methodologies, collecting data, and interpreting results. In accessibility, community-driven research ensures that disabled communities — particularly those in…

Constructivist Grounded Theory(also: CGT)

A qualitative research methodology developed by Kathy Charmaz that adapts classic grounded theory by acknowledging that the researcher's theoretical commitments and lived experience shape the categories that emerge from the data. Rather than claiming a neutral "view from…

Coping Strategy(also: Coping Behavior, Adaptive Strategy)

A behavioral pattern or workaround that users with disabilities employ when encountering inaccessible digital content or interfaces. Coping strategies emerge when technology fails to meet accessibility needs, forcing users to develop alternative approaches such as skipping…

Counterbalancing(also: Latin Square Design)

A research methodology technique used to control for order effects by systematically varying the sequence of conditions across participants. In accessibility research comparing multiple interface designs or assistive technology configurations, counterbalancing ensures that…

Counterventions(also: Countervention)

A concept introduced by Rua Williams, Louanne Boyd, and Juan Gilbert for reflexive interventions in HCI and design that unsettle ableist norms by shifting focus from individual deficit to exclusionary sociotechnical systems. Counterventions call for disabled people to be…

Critical Realism(also: Transcendental Realism, Critical Naturalism)

A philosophy of science developed by Roy Bhaskar that offers a middle position between positivism (reality is only what can be empirically observed) and radical constructivism (reality is entirely socially constructed). Critical realism holds that reality exists independently of…

Critical Technical Practice(also: CTP)

A research stance, articulated by Philip Agre in 1997, in which technologists reflect critically on the assumptions built into their own systems while continuing to build. Critical technical practice argues that technologies embody theory—every design choice encodes a…

Cross-Border Accessibility Research(also: International Accessibility Research, Transnational Accessibility Research)

Research collaborations that span national, cultural, and economic boundaries to address accessibility challenges that affect disabled people worldwide. Cross-border accessibility research aims to bridge the gap between well-resourced research institutions in the Global North…

Cumulative Link Mixed Model(also: CLMM, Ordinal Mixed Model)

A statistical model for analysing ordinal outcome data (such as Likert-scale ratings) that includes both fixed effects (experimental conditions) and random effects (participants, stimuli). CLMMs use a link function — commonly logit — to relate ordered categorical responses to…

Damage-centered Design(also: Damage-centered Research, Deficit-framed Design)

An approach in HCI and design research that frames marginalized communities - including disabled people, BIPOC communities, and others - primarily through the lens of harms, deficits, and barriers to be remediated. The term, popularized by Eve Tuck and extended by Alexandra To…

Deficit-Oriented Research(also: Deficit Model, Deficit-Based Approach)

A research approach that frames its subjects primarily in terms of what they lack, cannot do, or need to have fixed, rather than recognizing their strengths, agency, and lived expertise. In disability and accessibility research, deficit-oriented approaches treat disabled bodies…

Demand Characteristics

Cues within a research study that signal to participants what the researcher expects or hopes to find, leading participants to adjust their behavior or responses to meet those perceived expectations. In accessibility research, demand characteristics can be especially pronounced…

Deployment Study(also: Field Deployment, In-the-Wild Study)

A research method where technology is placed in users' real-world environments for an extended period to observe natural usage patterns, adoption behaviors, and long-term experiences. Unlike controlled lab studies, deployment studies capture ecological validity by revealing how…

Design-Based Research(also: DBR)

A collaborative, iterative research methodology used in education and human-computer interaction that develops theory and refines interventions through cycles of design, implementation, evaluation, and redesign in authentic real-world settings. DBR involves practitioners and…

Disability Simulation(also: Simulation Study, Simulated Disability)

A research or awareness technique where non-disabled individuals attempt to experience disability through artificial constraints such as blindfolds, noise-dampening headphones, vision-distorting glasses, or wheelchair use. While sometimes used for preliminary technology…

Disability-Centered Evaluation(also: Disability-Centric Evaluation, Disability-First Evaluation)

An approach to evaluating AI systems, tools, or research artefacts that places disabled people's lived experiences, information needs, and failure contexts at the centre of study design — including which data are collected, how ground truth is annotated, which models are tested,…

Disability-First Dataset(also: Disability-first AI dataset)

An approach to AI dataset creation, articulated by Theodorou et al. and others, that treats serving a disability community as the primary objective rather than collecting disability data as a minority slice of a general-purpose dataset. Examples include VizWiz (blind…

Disability-Led Research(also: Disabled-Led Research, Disability-Centered Research)

Research that is conceived, designed, conducted, and interpreted by disabled people rather than about them by non-disabled researchers. Disability-led research recognizes that disabled people hold unique expertise about their own experiences, needs, and solutions that cannot be…

Disability-first Design(also: Disability-first Approach, Disability-centered Design)

A design and research methodology that positions disabled people as active contributors and decision-makers rather than passive subjects or end-users in technology development. In contrast to approaches where non-disabled researchers create solutions for disabled users,…

Discriminative Ability(also: Discriminative ability of a metric, Discriminability)

In accessibility research methodology, the property of an evaluation metric to reveal statistically significant differences between stimuli that are known to differ along the dimension being measured. For example, a comprehension-question metric has discriminative ability for…

Disruptiveness index(also: D index, Disruption index, CD index)

A bibliometric measure that quantifies the degree to which a scientific paper disrupts or consolidates existing knowledge. Calculated from citation patterns, it ranges from -1 (fully consolidating, where subsequent papers always cite both the focal paper and its references) to 1…

Ecological Systems Theory(also: Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Model, Bioecological Model)

A developmental psychology framework created by Urie Bronfenbrenner that describes how individuals are influenced by multiple nested environmental systems: the microsystem (immediate settings like home and work), mesosystem (connections between microsystems), exosystem (indirect…

Electrodermal Activity(also: EDA, Galvanic Skin Response, GSR)

The variation of electrical conductance in the skin caused by sweat gland activity, which is controlled by the sympathetic nervous system. EDA is used as a physiological measure of emotional arousal and stress, with applications in accessibility research for understanding the…

Embodied Knowledge(also: Embodied expertise, Lived knowledge)

Knowledge that is grounded in bodily experience rather than externally observable behaviour or abstract rule - the kind of knowing a person who stutters has about the tension before a block, a blind person has about which photo crops preserve meaning, or a Deaf signer has about…

Ethnography(also: Ethnographic Research, Ethnographic Methods)

A qualitative research methodology originating in anthropology that involves observing people in their natural environments to understand their behaviours, practices, and social interactions in context. In accessibility research, ethnographic methods such as participant…

Ethnomethodology

A sociological approach, founded by Harold Garfinkel, that studies the everyday methods people use to make sense of and produce social order in interaction - the implicit rules and shared practices through which we treat ordinary situations as ordinary. Conversation analysis…

Evaluator Effect

The evaluator effect refers to the phenomenon where different accessibility evaluators identify different sets of problems when assessing the same website, leading to variability in evaluation results. This effect has been documented in both expert reviews and user testing,…

Experience-Based Co-Design(also: EBCD)

A participatory methodology originally developed in UK health services research that treats people's lived experience - their 'emotional touch-points' of confusion, frustration, or insight - as the core material for designing services or systems. Canonical EBCD stages include…

Experiential learning(also: Learning by doing, Experience-based learning)

Experiential learning is a pedagogical approach in which knowledge and skills are acquired through direct, concrete experience rather than passive instruction. Grounded in theories by Kolb and others, it involves a cycle of experiencing, reflecting, conceptualising, and…

Explanatory Sequential Design(also: Sequential Explanatory Design, QUAN → QUAL)

A mixed-methods research design in which a quantitative phase is conducted first — typically a survey or other structured measurement — and its results are then used to guide a follow-up qualitative phase (often semi-structured interviews) that explores or explains the…

FATE Framework(also: FATE, Fairness Accountability Transparency Ethics)

An ethical framework for evaluating AI and machine learning systems across four dimensions: Fairness (ensuring equitable treatment and outcomes across different groups), Accountability (establishing responsibility for system decisions and impacts), Transparency (making system…

Feasibility Study(also: Feasibility Trial, Pilot Study)

A feasibility study is a small-scale investigation conducted before a full-scale trial to determine whether a planned intervention or system can be delivered as intended in its real-world setting. Feasibility work asks practical questions — Can we recruit? Can participants…

Feminist HCI

An approach to human-computer interaction research and design articulated by Shaowen Bardzell that brings feminist theory, values, and methods into HCI practice. Feminist HCI foregrounds pluralism, embodiment, ecology, advocacy, self-disclosure, and participation; critiques…

Fixation Duration(also: Fixation Time, Gaze Duration)

The length of time the eye remains relatively still on a specific point in a visual display during reading or visual processing. In eye-tracking research, fixation duration is a key metric for measuring cognitive processing load and readability — shorter fixations are associated…

Gait analysis(also: Walking pattern analysis, Locomotion analysis)

The systematic study of human walking patterns, including step frequency, stride length, body sway, and turning behaviour, using sensors or observation. In accessibility research, gait analysis reveals that blind people who use white canes or guide dogs have distinct walking…

Growth mixture model(also: GMM, Latent class growth model)

A statistical method that identifies unobserved subpopulations (latent classes) within a dataset based on distinct patterns of change over time. In accessibility research, growth mixture models can reveal that a seemingly homogeneous user group actually contains distinct…