Project #
U.S. Bancorp is an American bank holding company based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the parent company of U.S. Bank National Association and is the fifth largest banking institution in the United States.
In December 2021, I conducted user research on the usability of Natural Language User Interface technology pertaining to people with disabilities.
Objective #
The goal of the research was to determine:
- What is big tech doing to make voice technology accessible?
- What are the user needs and known requirements for the technology?
- Which WCAG 2.1 success criterion may apply to voice technology in the future?
- Which WCAG 2.2 success criterion may apply to voice technology in the future?
- What are the general disability considerations for voice technology?
- Which specific disability considerations should we account for?
- What has academic research found out about voice technology user preferences/feature requests?
Work #
I conducted popular and academic research to answer the client's questions around disabilities and Natural Language User Interface technologies. In addition, I conducted semi-structured interviews with people with various disability types about the technology. I then created user profiles for people who might have difficulty using this technology.
End Result #
The deliverable report included research on Natural Language User Interface technology, current best practices, best practices in draft form, reporting information, and creating profiles around the people this technology might impact. We are still working as a group to develop this project further.
Team #
The team for this project included a diverse group of people from U.S. Bank (program/project managers, developers, designers, UX researchers, etc.) interested in Natural Language User Interface technology and a project manager from Deque who coordinated our meetings. I was primarily responsible for the research report, but I did consult with my mentor and a senior accessibility consultant to be sure I included all of the pertinent data available.
Reflection #
This project was a more difficult task than I first realized, as there is not much information shared in the public space about this topic. Either companies are doing this type of research "behind closed doors" or are not doing this type of research at all. In all areas of emerging technology, the accessibility field tends to be more reactive than proactive in its approach to solving or anticipating issues.
