About

Dara is a three year research project based at City St George's, University of London, with RADLD, Say Aphasia and the Stroke Association as partners. It is funded by the EPSRC.

Dara is investigating and creating inclusive data visualizations to support personal decision-making for people with acquired and developmental language disorders.

Study session where the participant and the researcher examine a physical data visualization on a colorful knitted textile scarf.

Aims

To understand how people with language disabilities use data visualization in decision-making and the challenges they face.

To co-design accessible, multi-sensory visualisations that enable effective personal decision-making for people with language disabilities.

To develop methods, guidelines and prototype tools to support the creation of accessible data visualizations.

To develop techniques that empower the participation of people with communication impairments in co-design.

Our Approach

We are running in-depth studies to investigate how people use and experience data visualization for everyday decision-making.
We want to know what works well, what barriers people face, and what workarounds they adopt.
We are using this knowledge in co-creation to design and test new, inclusive approaches to visualization.

Our Motivation

Accessibility research in data visualization has previously considered the needs of people with visual impairments and learning disabilities, but has not explored the needs of people with language disabilities.
We want to lead the way in expanding ideas of accessibility in data visualization to include adults with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) and aphasia.