Accessibility-Driven Information Transformations in Mixed-Visual Ability Work Teams
Yichun Zhao, Miguel A. Nacenta, Mahadeo A. Sukhai, Sowmya Somanath · 2026 · Proceedings of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '26) · doi:10.1145/3772318.3790872
Summary
This paper presents a five-day diary study with follow-up interviews and two focus groups, examining how mixed-visual ability work teams perform accessibility-driven information transformations. The authors recruited 30 participants (18 BLV, 12 sighted) across seven teams working in legal, non-profit, consulting, and academic contexts, collecting 404 diary entries and 29+ hours of interviews documenting 36 transformation cases. The central concept is representational transformation: when a shared representation such as a PDF, spreadsheet, diagram, or slideshow is inaccessible to one or more team members, someone must modify or re-create it in an accessible form so the team can collaborate. Prior work has examined this phenomenon at the individual level or within specific domains (e.g., code review, collaborative writing), but no study had systematically characterized how entire mixed-visual ability teams collectively adapt representations across everyday knowledge work. The authors develop an analytical structure that deconstructs transformation into three components: a trigger (work demand plus representational incompatibility), an action (transformation plus coordination), and a consequence (on the individual, team, and representation itself). This framework surfaces how the invisible labour of accessibility is distributed across teams, not just borne by individual BLV workers. The analysis led to four coordination patterns and a set of design opportunities for systems that better support mixed-visual ability collaboration.
Key findings
Transformations followed one of two mechanisms: simplification (n=19 cases), where a sophisticated representation is reduced to a more universally accessible format at the cost of lost functionality; and enhancement (n=13), where the representation is augmented with accessibility layers (alt-text, audio cues, high-contrast themes) while preserving its core capabilities. Enhancement was often abandoned because tools did not adequately support accessibility features, pushing teams toward pragmatic simplification. The authors identified four recurring patterns of coordination: (1) Disposable Fixes (19 cases, most common) — one person makes a one-off transformation for themselves or a colleague, with no durable artifact; (2) Transformed Becomes the Standard (9 cases) — a fix is adopted as the new team-wide representation through advocacy; (3) Parallel Representations (8 cases) — the team maintains multiple co-existing versions, creating synchronization overhead; and (4) Assembly (6 cases) — team members with different abilities each transform parts of a representation, integrated into a final multi-modal whole. Triggers ranged from reactive (encountering an inaccessible representation in the moment, n=16) to proactive (anticipating a teammate's needs in advance, n=9). Proactive triggers emerged as teams developed awareness of each other's abilities over time, producing what one participant called access intimacy. Coordination carried social, professional, and emotional costs: BLV workers described feeling like a bother when repeatedly requesting accessibility help, and disposable fixes often defaulted to solitary action to avoid perceived burden on colleagues. The paper also notes that the prevalence of disposable fixes reflects a systemic failure to integrate accessibility into tooling and culture.
Relevance
This paper is highly relevant to workplace accessibility practice because it reframes accessibility as a collective, infrastructural responsibility rather than an individual accommodation. For BLV employees and allied professionals, the findings validate something often felt but rarely articulated: the additional labour of representational transformation is real, distributed unevenly, and frequently invisible to management and organizational accessibility policies. For design and HCI practitioners, the four patterns provide a diagnostic lens. A team dominated by disposable fixes likely signals a tooling or culture gap worth investigating. The authors' recommendation to build anticipation into software (for example, Word accessibility checkers extended with team-member profiles) suggests a productive direction for inclusive collaborative tools. For organizations like CNIB, the paper's findings support several concrete interventions: normalizing discussions of access needs through open workplace culture, treating persistent inaccessibility from external providers as an advocacy matter at the organizational level (not just individual burden), and integrating low-barrier help-seeking directly into representations. The concept of access intimacy — deep mutual awareness of each other's access needs — offers a meaningful target for team development beyond formal compliance.
Tags: blind and low vision · workplace accessibility · mixed-ability teams · diary study · invisible work · information representation · assistive technology · CSCW · access intimacy