Enhanced Accessibility of Facebook Messenger for Blind Users

Abstract

With the growth in technology, social networking became an important factor of human life. People connect and share information through social media applications, such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Though, it is witnessed that using such applications is challenging for blind users. Such applications are also stated as highly inaccessible. The purpose of this study is to examine the worth of the Facebook Messenger application by using smartphone devices for blind users. Firstly, an experiment is conducted with five selected blind people and their performance and interaction is observed with the existing Facebook Messenger application. To minimize the difficulties observed during initial experiment Phase I, a prototype is designed and implemented based on existing WCAG guidelines. Twenty-one blind users experienced both the proposed prototype as well as the Existing Messenger Application. The efficiency is measured by applying a t-test whereas the SUS questionnaires are used to measure the satisfaction. The findings have shown the proposed design of the prototype fulfills the efficiency and user satisfaction for blind users. Finally, future work is recommended based on the acquired outcome to enhance the usability of social media applications.