Glossary

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AI Confidence(also: Model Confidence, Prediction Confidence)

A measure of how certain an AI model is about a particular output or prediction. In the context of image descriptions for BLV users, AI confidence can be communicated through various means: internal probability scores (often unavailable for black-box commercial models), natural…

AI Content Describer(also: NVDA AI Content Describer)

AI Content Describer is an add-on for the NVDA screen reader that uses multimodal AI models to generate descriptions of on-screen visual content — images, controls, icons, charts, and arbitrary screen regions — on demand. It gives NVDA users a JAWS-Picture-Smart-equivalent…

AI Dubbing(also: AI Voice Generation, Neural TTS Dubbing)

The use of artificial intelligence text-to-speech systems to generate spoken narration and character dialogue for media production. In accessible webtoon and comic production, AI dubbing offers a cost-effective alternative to professional voice actors, enabling scalable…

AI Fairness(also: Algorithmic Fairness, Fair AI)

The principle that AI systems should not create or reinforce unfair bias against particular groups. Standard AI fairness frameworks primarily address race and gender but are increasingly recognized as inadequate for disability, because disability is often invisible,…

AI Ghostwriter Effect(also: Ghostwriter Effect)

A phenomenon, first named by Draxler and colleagues, in which people who use AI writing assistants do not perceive themselves as authors or owners of the resulting text yet still publicly self-declare authorship. The effect persists even when personalization makes outputs…

AI Hallucination(also: Model Hallucination, Confabulation)

The phenomenon where an AI model generates confident, plausible-sounding responses that are factually incorrect, fabricated, or not grounded in the actual input data. In accessibility contexts, AI hallucinations pose a serious safety concern — for example, a multimodal AI…

AI Hiring Interview(also: Automated Video Interview, AVI, Asynchronous Video Interview)

An asynchronous job-interview process in which candidates record video responses to pre-recorded or text-based questions on a platform that uses artificial intelligence to analyse facial expressions, vocal cues, word choice, and behavioural signals to score suitability.…

AI Homogenization(also: AI-Driven Homogenization, Generative AI Homogenization Effect)

The tendency for generative AI systems to produce outputs that converge toward similar patterns, reducing the diversity and uniqueness of results across different users and contexts. In accessibility and assistive technology, AI homogenization is particularly concerning because…

AI Incident Database(also: AIID, AI Incident Tracker)

A publicly accessible repository that documents reported incidents where AI-driven systems have caused harm or produced negative outcomes for individuals, communities, or society. Major databases include AIAAIC (AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Incidents and Controversies), the…

AI Mental Model(also: Mental Model of AI, User Mental Model of AI)

A user's conceptual representation of how an artificial intelligence system works, including beliefs about its information sources, processing methods, capabilities, and limitations. Mental models of AI are often incomplete, oversimplified, or erroneous, which can lead to…

AI Over-Reliance(also: Automation Bias (AI), Over-Reliance on AI)

The tendency of users to accept AI system outputs — recommendations, classifications, or content — without sufficient critical evaluation, even when those outputs are wrong or biased. Over-reliance is a well-documented AI safety concern and is especially consequential in…

AI Overreliance(also: Automation Bias, Over-Trust in AI)

The tendency for users to trust AI systems more than is warranted by their actual accuracy, accepting AI-generated outputs without sufficient critical evaluation. In accessibility contexts, AI overreliance is a significant safety concern because blind and low vision users of…

AI Proxy(also: AI Proxying)

A design pattern in which an AI system acts on a user's behalf within a social, communicative, or interpretive setting — for example, generating a facial expression, voice, or written reply that represents the user to others — rather than merely assisting the user with a…

AI Recourse(also: Algorithmic Recourse, AI Appeal Mechanism)

The ability of individuals negatively affected by AI-driven decisions to challenge, appeal, or seek correction of those decisions. For people with disabilities, AI recourse is particularly critical because AI systems frequently make consequential decisions about welfare…

AI Suitcase(also: AI-suitcase, Accessibility AI Suitcase)

A suitcase-shaped autonomous navigation robot for blind and low-vision travellers, developed as an open research platform by IBM Research, Carnegie Mellon University, Miraikan (the Japanese National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation), and project partners. The user holds…

AI Trust Calibration(also: Trust Calibration, Appropriate Trust)

The process of aligning a user's level of trust in an AI system with the system's actual reliability and capabilities. In accessibility contexts, trust calibration is critical because blind and low vision users of AI-powered visual access tools tend to over-trust AI-generated…

AI Verification(also: Accessible AI Verification, AI Output Verification)

The process of checking and confirming the accuracy of AI-generated output, particularly by end users who may not have visual access to the original content. For blind users, AI verification is challenging because they cannot visually compare AI output against source material.…

AI Verification Loop(also: AI Feedback Loop, AI Query Loop)

An interactive process where a user queries an AI system to verify the correctness of their work, receives descriptive feedback, and iterates based on that feedback. In accessible tool design, AI verification loops allow users who cannot perceive visual output to confirm that…

AI contestability(also: Algorithmic contestability, AI contestation)

The principle that users should be able to challenge, question, and seek recourse against decisions or outputs made by AI systems. In accessibility contexts, contestability is particularly important for blind users who rely on AI for visual access — they need mechanisms to flag…

AI disability representation(also: AI disability simulation, Disability representation in AI)

The portrayal or simulation of disabled experiences, communication styles, or perspectives by artificial intelligence systems. AI disability representation raises significant ethical concerns: while AI can make disability awareness training more scalable and interactive, it…

AI ethics(also: Artificial intelligence ethics, Machine learning ethics)

The field concerned with ensuring that artificial intelligence systems are developed and deployed in ways that are fair, transparent, accountable, and respectful of human rights. In accessibility contexts, AI ethics addresses concerns about algorithmic bias that may disadvantage…

AI for Accessibility(also: AI4A, Artificial Intelligence for Accessibility)

An umbrella framing used by technology companies and researchers for applications of artificial intelligence — including computer vision, natural language processing, speech recognition, and generative models — intended to benefit disabled users. Common examples include…

AI hallucination(also: Model hallucination, Confabulation)

The generation of plausible-sounding but factually incorrect or fabricated information by AI systems, particularly large language and multimodal models. In accessibility applications, AI hallucinations are especially dangerous because users who cannot independently verify visual…

AI in Education(also: AIEd, Educational AI)

The application of artificial intelligence technologies in educational settings, including intelligent tutoring systems, automated assessment, personalized learning pathways, content generation, and teacher support tools. AI in education has expanded rapidly with generative AI,…

AI literacy(also: Artificial intelligence literacy, Algorithm literacy)

The knowledge, skills, and critical awareness needed to understand, evaluate, and effectively engage with artificial intelligence systems. For people with disabilities, AI literacy is particularly important because lack of understanding about how AI tools work — including their…

AI sycophancy(also: Sycophantic AI, AI agreeableness bias)

The tendency of AI systems, particularly large language models, to provide overly affirmative, agreeable, or encouraging responses that cater to the user rather than providing accurate information. In accessibility contexts, AI sycophancy poses serious safety risks — for…

AI transparency(also: Algorithmic transparency, Model transparency)

The practice of making artificial intelligence systems understandable to users and stakeholders, including how they work, what data they use, and the confidence levels of their outputs. For assistive technology users, AI transparency enables informed decision-making about when…

AI-Assisted Editing(also: AI-Powered Editing, Intelligent Editing)

The use of artificial intelligence to support or automate aspects of content editing, such as suggesting improvements, applying changes based on user intent expressed in natural language, or automatically adjusting visual parameters. For blind creators, AI-assisted editing can…

AI-Fabrication(also: AI-Assisted Fabrication, AI-Driven Fabrication)

The use of artificial intelligence tools, particularly generative AI, to support the design and manufacturing of physical objects through digital fabrication methods such as 3D printing and laser cutting. In assistive technology contexts, AI-fabrication combines text-to-image…

AI-Generated Alt Text(also: Automated Alt Text, AI Image Descriptions)

Alternative text for images that is automatically generated by artificial intelligence systems rather than written by humans. AI-generated alt text has become increasingly common on social media platforms and in accessibility tools, using computer vision and multimodal language…

AI-Generated Content(also: AIGC)

An umbrella term for text, images, audio, video, and other media produced by generative AI systems — especially large language models and diffusion-based text-to-image or text-to-video models — in response to user prompts. AIGC is widely used in creative tooling (backdrop…

AI-Generated Speech(also: Synthetic Speech, AI Speech)

Speech audio produced by artificial intelligence systems — typically neural text-to-speech or voice cloning models — rather than recorded from a human speaker. Deaf and hard-of-hearing content creators increasingly use AI-generated speech to add spoken-language tracks to signed…

AI-Mediated Communication(also: AI-Assisted Communication)

Communication that is facilitated, enhanced, or generated with the assistance of artificial intelligence tools. This includes AI-powered text generation, speech-to-text transcription, real-time translation, message drafting, and communication augmentation for people with speech…

AI-Mediated Dialogue

A paradigm in which a large language model (or similar conversational agent) stands between a user and a task, simulated social situation, or another user — either producing the conversational partner's turns, coaching the user's next turn, or both. AI-mediated dialogue is…

AJAX(also: Ajax, Asynchronous JavaScript and XML)

AJAX is a set of web development techniques that allow web pages to communicate with a server and update portions of the page content without requiring a full page reload. AJAX poses major accessibility challenges because dynamic content updates happen silently in the DOM,…

ALTO(also: Analyzed Layout and Text Object, ALTO XML)

An open XML format maintained by the US Library of Congress that stores the output of OCR (optical character recognition) together with the layout information of the scanned pages: character positions, confidence scores, candidate alternative characters, block and line geometry,…

AODA(also: Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act)

Canadian provincial legislation enacted in 2005 that sets out a roadmap to make Ontario fully accessible by 2025. AODA establishes mandatory accessibility standards across five areas: customer service, information and communications, employment, transportation, and the design of…

APK(also: Android Package, Android Application Package)

The file format used to distribute and install Android applications, containing compiled code, resources, assets, certificates, and a manifest describing the app's components and permissions. Accessibility researchers and auditors frequently work with APK files directly — either…

AR Marker(also: Fiducial marker, Augmented reality marker)

A printed visual pattern (often a square with a distinctive black-and-white code) placed in the environment that a smartphone or AR headset camera can recognise to determine its own position and orientation with high precision. In blind-navigation research, AR markers are placed…

ARASAAC(also: Aragonese Portal of Augmentative and Alternative Communication)

A publicly funded open pictogram library maintained by the Government of Aragon, Spain, providing nearly 12,000 colour and black-and-white pictograms licensed under Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA). ARASAAC symbols are widely used worldwide in augmentative and alternative…

ARIA(also: Accessible Rich Internet Applications, WAI-ARIA)

A W3C specification that provides a framework of roles, states, and properties to make dynamic web content and custom user interface controls accessible to assistive technologies. ARIA supplements HTML semantics where native elements are insufficient. The first rule of ARIA is:…

ARIA Hidden(also: aria-hidden Attribute)

An WAI-ARIA attribute (aria-hidden="true") that removes an element and its descendants from the accessibility tree, making them invisible to screen readers and other assistive technologies while potentially remaining visually visible. ARIA hidden is used to suppress decorative…

ARIA Live Region(also: Live Region, ARIA Live)

An ARIA live region is a section of a web page marked with the aria-live attribute that announces dynamic content changes to assistive technologies without requiring user focus to move to the updated area. Live regions are essential for making real-time updates — such as status…

ARIA Live Region(also: Live Region, aria-live)

A section of a web page marked with the aria-live attribute that is dynamically updated and should be announced by assistive technologies when changes occur, even if the user's focus is elsewhere. Live regions have politeness levels: "polite" (announced at the next convenient…

ARIA Live Regions(also: Live Regions, aria-live)

ARIA live regions are areas of a web page that dynamically update with new content and use WAI-ARIA attributes to communicate those changes to assistive technologies. The aria-live attribute (with values of off, polite, or assertive) tells screen readers how urgently to announce…

ARKit(also: Apple ARKit)

ARKit is Apple's augmented reality development framework for iOS that enables developers to create AR experiences for iPhone and iPad. It uses the device's camera, motion sensors, and processor to detect surfaces, track movement, and place virtual 3D objects in the real world.…

ASCII(also: American Standard Code for Information Interchange)

A character encoding standard that uses numeric codes to represent letters, digits, punctuation, and control characters in computers and communication equipment. ASCII assigns values 0-127 to 128 characters, covering the basic Latin alphabet. In accessibility contexts, ASCII is…

ASL(also: American Sign Language)

Abbreviation for American Sign Language, the primary sign language used by Deaf communities in the United States and much of Canada. ASL is a complete, natural language with its own grammar, vocabulary, and specialized registers (including STEM vocabulary), and is linguistically…

ASL Dictionary(also: Sign Language Dictionary, ASL Lexicon)

A reference resource for looking up American Sign Language signs and their meanings. Unlike dictionaries for written languages, ASL dictionaries face unique challenges because signs cannot be typed as search queries. Traditional ASL dictionaries organize signs alphabetically by…

ASL Gloss(also: Sign Language Gloss, Glossing)

A written notation system used to transcribe sign language by representing each sign with an English word written in capital letters. ASL gloss is used primarily for linguistic research, teaching, and documentation purposes rather than as a standard writing system for everyday…