A Brief Introduction to Disabilities

Assistive technology is used to compensate for the loss of a normal human functioning. Understanding which impairments affect functional losses is the beginning of designing, producing, and selecting for service assistive technology.

The Trace Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison works to make computers accessible to people with all types of disabilities. As part of their process, Trace has written "A Brief Introduction to Disabilities"¹. The document gives a brief introduction to visual impairments, hearing impairments, physical impairments, cognitive/language impairments, seizure disorders, and multiple impairments, listing some specific barriers to accessibility that people with these disabilities encounter.

In "Thirty-Something Million: Should They Be Exceptions?"² an article highlighting the importance of designing products with disabilities in mind, Vanderheiden lists several statistics about the number and types of disabilities in the United States. One of the interesting point he makes is that as people age they naturally lose functional ability, they become disabled. Vanderheiden displays with well placed graphs to illustrate his point that if one lives long enough then one is likely to need adaptations and assistive technology.

One more point from Thirty-Something Million: as the population ages the learning disabilities, the prevalent disability in the younger years, gives way to mobility, vision, and hearing disabilities as the prevalent category in the older years. Learning disabilities are the top issue that schools have to address. While the least restrictive environment must be maintained for all, learning disabilities are prevalent in the K-12 years.

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(1) Vanderheiden, G. C., & Vanderheiden, K. R. (1991). A brief introduction to disabilities. [Online]. In Accessible Design of Consumer Products: Guidelines for the Design of Consumer Products to Increase Their Accessibility to People with Disabilities or Who are Aging (pp. 84). Madison, Wisconsin: Trace Research & Development Center.

(2) Vanderheiden, G. C. (1990). Thirty-something million: Should they be exceptions? [Online]. Human Factors, 32(4), 14.