Library and Information Statistics Unit Occasional Paper 26. Public Library Services for Visually Impaired People

Citation

Brophy, P. (2002), "Library and Information Statistics Unit Occasional Paper 26. Public Library Services for Visually Impaired People", Journal of Documentation, Vol. 58 No. 1, pp. 123-125. https://doi.org/10.1108/jd.2002.58.1.123.9

Although very different, both of these reports offer useful contributions to the growing literature on information access and disability. Carey and Stringer’s approach is essentially theoretical, offering a conceptual model which suggests a solution to information access by people with disabilities but demonstrating a “design for all” approach. Kinnell, Yu and Creaser have surveyed the provision of services for people with visual impairments in UK public libraries, based largely on an extensive survey carried out in 1999.

To turn to Carey and Stringer first: the focus of their report is on navigation within information environments. The authors discuss the traditional ways of organising information (which they characterise as “hierarchies”, “matrices”, “alphabetical or numerical sequences”, “degrees of magnitude” and “degrees of centrality” or “relevance”’ ) and of assigning value. The latter, it is suggested, consists of three major characteristics, “source”, “publisher” and “structure”. Structure “transforms data into information”. Both of these sections would have merited more extensive analysis and are thus open to some criticism. However, in a short piece of work (with very limited funding) it is reasonable to take them at face value and explore where they lead.

To complete the background, there follows a section on “3‐dimensional navigation on a 2‐dimensional screen”, which draws attention to the conventions which enable users to understand the information that is being conveyed, and sections on “search strategies” and “rules”. Again, each of these sections is short – probably too short in reality since the overall impression is one of exemplars rather than evidenced reasoning – and provides a summary of the issues which need to be considered. However, section 8 entitled “Disability, searching and navigation” focuses attention on the central issue and contains a number of crucial statements: “it is important not to create an artificial apartheid between fully able and disabled people”; “the user should have control over the rate at which information is delivered and the level of complexity with which it is delivered”, and so on.

The second half of the report, which gets to the core of the issue, is concerned with the derivation of an “optimal information navigation system”. Here the title comes into play: in essence the argument is that the unlimited branches and levels of hierarchical systems, and their lack of conventions, inevitably lead to poor usability. Instead a rule is needed to constrain the options, such as “each node must have no more than nine links”. (The choice of nine is justified in a number of ways, but the pragmatic one that it provides single‐keystroke choice in a decimal system – with a spare key for function calls – later becomes clear. The advantages of this for users with disabilities are enormous.)

The authors also propose that there should be no more than nine levels, and that all links should be bi‐directional, with no preferred direction. All relationships should be based on context, not on categories. It is argued that the inherent limitation of any one system in terms of the number of nodes which can describe information objects could be overcome by introducing three “modes” or “levels” of system – in effect (though the authors protest that it need not be so) reintroducing a very limited hierarchy.

The ideas in this report are intriguing. While they are open to a number of criticisms, the benefits of applying such a conceptual model could be enormous – if it could be shown to work. It is to be hoped, therefore, that the authors find funding to continue exploring this approach, perhaps in collaboration with an established academic research team.

Kinnell, Yu and Creaser, in contrast, report on a detailed survey of the services for visually‐impaired people which are in place in UK public library authorities. This work was undertaken to update earlier surveys, e.g. Chartres (1997), and assess whether any progress was being made. All UK public library authorities were sent a questionnaire and 67 per cent responded. The analysis reveals that, while there have been improvements, the level of service is patchy with many authorities failing to make adequate provision. Indeed, given that the UK passed into law a Disability Discrimination Act in 1995, it is surprising to discover that 42 per cent of the respondents had not even developed a written policy on such services.

While the survey does reveal that there is good practice to be found, it also shows up alarming gaps and suggests that there is a “postcode lottery” at work as far as visually‐impaired people are concerned – what you get depends heavily on where you live. What, for example, are we to make of the finding that less than a quarter of authorities (and this is about authorities, not about branches) have computers or software adapted for visually impaired people? Hardly an advertisement for the inclusive public library service which is so often talked about! Indeed at times the results become almost farcical: thus 93 per cent of respondents, when asked what services they do provide, reply that they allow in guide dogs for the blind, but what the remaining 7 per cent are doing beggars the imagination. (Perhaps the popular image of the librarian hissing “quiet” needs to be replaced with one bellowing “get that guide dog out of here”!) Less than a third of authorities offer training in the use of special equipment. Less than a fifth offer brailling of library materials. Only 14 per cent provide tactile signs.

One could go on. Suffice it to say that this report is an indictment of the UK public library service. Its practitioners need to wake up.