All time references are in CEST
Current developments in improving digital accessibility of web surveys |
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| Session Organisers | Dr Marika de Bruijne (Centerdata) Ms Mara Verheijen (Centerdata) |
| Time | Tuesday 18 July, 09:00 - 10:30 |
| Room | |
Everybody, regardless of their abilities or disabilities, should be able to fill out web surveys that are offered to the whole population. This session focuses on the current developments to improve the digital accessibility of web surveys. Under web surveys, we understand surveys offered via all different devices with internet access.
A large part of the population in Europe lives with disabilities. According to the WHO, this is about 135 million in the WHO European Region. Persons with disabilities include “people with long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments that, in interaction with various barriers, may hinder their full and effective participation society on an equal basis with others”, as defined by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
As of June 2025, the European Accessibility Act (EAA) will be enforced. This EU directive requires that digital products and services, such as websites, are accessible to persons with disabilities. How should survey researchers respond to these requirements? Which impairments of respondents should web surveys take into account? The established standard to assess digital accessibility is provided by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0. These guidelines are based on four main principles: Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, and Robust (POUR). But how should the WCAG and their principles be applied to web surveys?
For this session, we invite papers and presentations that address the aforementioned questions and, for example, one of the following topics:
• Best practices for developing digitally accessible web surveys
• Applying WCAG to web surveys
• Providing web surveys to persons with physical or mental disabilities
• Providing web surveys to elderly people
• Improving respondents’ user experience by adding accessibility features to web surveys
We invite both survey methodologists as well as survey practitioners to present their current findings.
Keywords: web surveys, survey design, digital accessibility, accessible surveys, disabilities, WCAG
Ms Marlen Paulitti (Centerdata) - Presenting Author
Mr Arnaud Wijnant (Centerdata)
People with mental disabilities often encounter difficulties in accessing and navigating web content. Since the 1990s, several organizations have worked on developing guidelines to ensure internet accessibility to all users. Among others, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) from the W3C Consortium are recognized as the golden standard. These guidelines were created with the objective of making the web accessible and usable for all users, regardless of their abilities and knowledge. Additionally, many researchers have further investigated how to make online tools and platforms, including those for data collection, more accessible. The recent pandemic was a key factor in fostering this stream of research, since it propelled the transition to self-completion approaches in data collection.
This presentation focuses on a stylesheet developed for web self-completion surveys, tailored based on previous research findings and on the WCAG guidelines. This stylesheet builds on the one currently used in the LISS (Longitudinal Internet studies for the Social Sciences) panel. Its validity was tested in an experiment conducted between November and December 2024 within the Centerpanel, founded in 1991 and comprising over 1,500 households drawn on the basis of national postal delivery points in the Netherlands. In the experiment, half of the panelists were randomly assigned to complete the same questionnaire, either using the usual stylesheet or the newly developed one. This presentation focuses here on the preliminary findings from the experiment. Our ultimate goal is to implement this questionnaire layout in the AWVB Panel, a Dutch web panel designed for people with intellectual disabilities.
Dr Barbara Thumann (SHARE Berlin Institute) - Presenting Author
Dr Marika de Bruijne (Centerdata)
Ms Theresa Fabel (SHARE Berlin Institute)
Dr Daniel Horn (SHARE Berlin Institute)
Dr Yuri Pettinicchi (SHARE Berlin Institute)
Dr Elena Sommer (German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin))
Dr Michael Bergmann (SHARE Berlin Institute)
The Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) will administer a self-completion web questionnaire as part of an experimental study that utilizes a concurrent mixed-mode design (web questionnaire and paper & pencil questionnaire) in 4–6 European countries in autumn 2025. This experiment aims to provide valuable insights into the feasibility of conducting web surveys among Europeans aged 50 and older, many of whom face disabilities such as impaired eyesight.
In this context, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) play a crucial role. We will evaluate the applicability of these guidelines to our web survey and detail the specific recommendations that have been implemented. For example, the web questionnaire will allow respondents to pause and resume completion without losing previously entered information (guideline 2.2).
We will also address the guidelines that could not be fully implemented, such as ensuring all functionality is accessible via a keyboard (guideline 2.1), and provide an explanation for these limitations. Lastly, we will outline additional measures taken to improve accessibility for our target population. Examples include designing the survey to be compatible with various devices and providing access details to the survey via both email and postal letters.