How to create a website suitable for the elderly

The requirements of the elderly for software and websites are not very different from those of ordinary people. Of course, they do not need protection. Let's take a look at their needs. Tu fui and ego eris mean: "I used to be you, and you will eventually become me. For usability professionals, it is a lesson in design for the elderly. The elderly are not a group of people with odd or unexpected requirements. They are the same as us-but older. At first, they were ignored by developers. Today, people over the age of 60 have gradually received the attention of developers. Their application to the Internet has evolved from email communication with their children and grandchildren to booking holidays, ordering goods, stock trading, and other aspects, forming a political and social activity group. There must be a demand-as people begin to provide websites and products for the elderly, developers also find the design motivation to meet their special needs. But what are the special availability requirements of the elderly? It may be much less than we thought. Their design and availability requirements are not fundamentally different from those of other groups, but they only place different emphasis on the overall environment, needs, and interests. Technical issues for many people, terms, slang, and technical languages all form available obstacles, especially for older people, because they seldom see these terms. According to a survey conducted by the availability consulting firm Webcredible, older people do not know much about terms such as "minimize" or "scroll" and seldom download them-either because they are afraid of "bugs ", or install Adobe Acrobat Reader. In addition, it takes longer for them to establish the mental model of hyperlink working principles, so they may miss important links or click error projects without links. Conceptual design for the elderly is based on clear concepts. What is the purpose of the website? What are the purposes of each area and subarea on each webpage? How do they interact with each other? How to easily navigate between these parts? There may not be much new content in these areas, but there may be a lot of key differences. The success of many websites depends on the mental patterns of how our website works, and the degree to which our preferred website complies with these patterns. Elderly people accept clear patterns, especially website unique behavior, which is slow. Therefore, although they can quickly understand the drop-down menu behavior, they may not realize the need to scroll the page. The design can solve many problems of this type, such as limiting the content in a webpage (completely avoiding scrolling) and using the "click here" hyperlink to reduce misunderstandings. Design issues many websites designed to be called the elderly do provide useful suggestions or services to family and caregivers of the elderly. Therefore, it is important not to exclude some groups directly or indirectly. Simon Bottrell, designer at the consulting firm NeoCreative, recommends that you avoid using colored crayons, large fonts, and "Grandma colors" related to such websites ". He said that for many elderly people, treating them in a protective way is more objectionable than deceiving them with science. NeoCreative recently redesigned the information website "advice and care". During the design process, the Bottrell team first established a clearly stated concept through excellent design. Bottrell focuses on ease of use, font type and size, and background comparison, so that color labels and titles play an important role in distinguishing information types. The San serif font is clearer than the serif font, but the comparative serif font is used to highlight the title. The font is too small to make people feel uncomfortable and reduce the amount of effective information; the font is too small to see clearly. A font of 10 or 12 lbs can be a good choice-as long as it can be easily adjusted. Designing for the elderly is a typical example of applying rational design principles, but you must pay more attention to visual limitations and be careful when using technical terms. This is also the best way to solve the only characteristic of the elderly-decreased vision. Easy-to-adjust text size, limited amount of text (increased ease of text and reduced the need for scrolling), clear and prominent hyperlinks, strong contrast, all these factors help improve user recognition of the website, form a more accurate mental model, and finally establish a more convenient website. Joanna Bawa is a usability consultant and technical writer. Over the past 15 years, she has been engaged in analyzing, evaluating, and improving information quality and availability in large minicomputers and companies.