push a button and then people hear it
and they’re all like ‘What is that?’ and
it just kind of draws attention to me, I
feel like, in the wrong way—in a way I
don’t want attention drawn to me. So I
just kind of try to avoid that as much as
possible.”
Unlike her talking watches, Sara
found her tactile watch to be quiet,
unobtrusive, and efficient at helping
her tell the time. She also said that
while the tactile watch was convenient
and discreet enough for telling time,
it lacked a built-in alarm function; instead, she relied on other electronic
timekeeping devices for her morning
alarm. She also described the delicate
nature of the watch’s physical makeup,
sharing anecdotes of how easily the
glass cover cracked or how frequently
the batteries died and the inconvenience it caused. She also talked about
preferring the aesthetic appeal and
comfort of the tactile watch compared
to her talking watches:
Interviewer: “Are there other preferences you have to your [tactile] watch,
as opposed to the talking watches?”
Sara: “It’s more comfortable... The
other ones kind of look like big clunky
sports watches. Sort of chunky. I just
feel like it’s more comfortable.”
JAWS screen reader. Sara’s JAWS
screen reader works alongside her
Windows operating system. She uses
it to read aloud the text in the applications on her monitor by controlling
an on-screen cursor through a series
of hotkeys. Sara uses JAWS as a means
to use her software applications: instant messaging, email, browsing the
Internet, word processing, and backing up CDs.
PhotoGraPh by natasha Dunn
Although JAWS increases her access
to her computer, many interaction issues remain. For example, because
JAWS is a text screen reader, it does
not recognize pictures and graphics
(ranging from chat emoticons to navigation tools on Web sites) and often
gives vague feedback in describing
where a graphic is placed in a document or Web page. One of the biggest
challenges of using a screen reader
is orientation and navigation. If Sara
moves to another task or accidentally
hits the wrong hot key, she might find
herself in an unfamiliar virtual setting
that requires her to suspend the current task, reorient herself, then resume
Braille watch with retractable glass cover
and tactile numbers and hands.
where she left off. Her tenacity in the
face of these obstacles is illustrated
in the following transcript segment in
which she is trying to navigate through
frames on a course home page to get to
a discussion board.
Sara: “...I’m going to go back into
the links list [JAWS speaks through the
links in order: “communication, assignments, rules, contacts...”] no, silly, I
wanted to go to discussion board. [tries
a few more links, and the computer says
them out loud] okay, it’s not in the right
place where I thought it was. Let me try
that again, I’m sorry. [starts through
the links list again] Okay, discussion
board, I’m tabbing through this time
and not going through the links [the
computer talks] I’m on there, c’mon go
back to the discussion board [silence,
then the computer speaks] come on...
Go to the discussion board. Now. [the
computer speaks again] okay, let’s try
this again. I’m going to right-click it. I
press the right mouse button, which is
this one... Okay, press Enter and see if I
go anywhere. Why is it misbehaving?”
At this point, having tried all that
she could think to do, Sara is frustrated
and anxious to move on. It is only on
starting over by reentering the URL of
the Web page and carefully stepping
through each action that she finally is
able to find the discussion board.
Sara: “Okay, now it’s taking me back
to the home page. So let’s try this again.
Okay, I’m going back into the links list.
Pressing Enter. Come on… [quiet for
some time; the computer appears to be
opening the link and suddenly speaks
again] Oh, here we go. [the links list appears on the screen] Okay, now let’s go
to the discussion board. ‘D’ for discussion board. [the computer goes through
the details for the page, a heading, the
number of links, and more].”
Sara employs two specific, strategic workarounds here. First, she tries
all the options available to her. When
none lead to the expected outcome,
she aborts the original operation and
begins again. Both tactics are brute-force, when-all-else-fails solutions that
are time-consuming and sometimes
frustrating but that are most likely to
yield desired results. As multiple programs are always running on the computer, just making a diagnostic check
of where things are “located” can be
time-consuming and difficult. This
sometimes poses limitations on the
usability of JAWS; Sara’s workaround
here is to repeatedly try different operations until her intentions are fulfilled.
From this experimentation and practice, she is able to learn pragmatically
what works and what doesn’t.
Though the quotes indicate the
considerable usability problems Sara
encounters in using JAWS, they also
affect issues of socially situated meaning. As a student, she relies on the
computer and Internet for social connections and course-related communication. Raising the cost of performing relatively simple operations that
are error-prone and resistant to efficient workarounds affects Sara’s ability to access the information required
to be a full participant in courses and
engage in social interaction online.
Insights
Having understood limitations and
workarounds in isolation, we identified recurrent themes common across
objects and tasks. Sara’s actions and
associations with objects and tasks
were guided by both the usability of the
object and the meaning she accorded
to the task. A stronger personal preference or significant item or task often
motivated her to overcome physical obstacles at almost any cost. In the table,
the “Workaround” column lists the alternatives Sara employed to get around
limitations. Additionally, we added
