A later section analyses in detail the difficulties encountered in producing a usable website. This debate will not be repeated here, however, the inability to produce a project website did affect the methodology adopted and so this aspect will be discussed. The original proposal was to initially ascertain the ability of user testers on the project website to gauge their general competence in using internet resources. The test site was arranged so that the initial stage of joining the project required user testers registering on the site. From here a series of simple check boxes were provided for people to answer general questions such as ‘do you define yourself as disabled? (See appendix xxx for full list of questions). After completing the registration and answering the series of questions, user testers were then invited to download a simple curriculum vitae, read a job and person specification, and then apply for the sample job to the project. The project website was commissioned with a web development organisation who had won awards for the accessibility of their work. Their brief was to create the project website to standard accessibility guidelines, making both the user interface and contents management suite (CMS) fully accessible. It was important that the CMS was accessible as one of the research team is a screen reader user and would be required to manage and add material to the site. The agreed delivery of the site was to have been summer 2006. However, the site was not ready for launch until mid November 2006, too late to complete the project on time. Hence a contingency strategy adopted a secondary method.
From early 2006, two national organisations concerned with the welfare and rights of disabled people had agreed to join the research and invite a sample of their clients who were computer users to join the project as user testers. One organisation had predominantly visually impaired clients who provided a range of different methods of computer access including screen readers, text magnification, and in some case a combination of both. The second organisation could provide user testers with mobility and dexterity difficulties together with people who used speech recognition software. In total this amounted to 30 user testers with a broad range of experiences and methods of accessing computers.
The method we had planned to adopt was firstly to hold standard focus group sessions (Bryman and Burgess 1999; Silverman 1997) in the premises of the two organisations. The focus group sessions were to be recorded for later analysis. At these sessions user testers were invited to express their experiences of using the internet and assisting in developing the research methodology. Additionally, they were invited to access the project website, take the accessibility test and then attempt to access two prominent employment related websites. The final aspect of the test was to record on the project website their experiences when interacting with the employment related sites. Although the sample was relatively small, nevertheless it would produce a broad range of user testers which would validate the methodology (Mason 1996: 84). However, because of the slippage in the delivery of the project website, holding the focus group sessions was also delayed to a point in September 2006 where the method was abandoned and user testers would be asked to access two employment related websites and report back their experiences at the focus group sessions.
Once again, the planned methodology did not take place. Although the organisation which assisted visually impaired people could provide 11 user testers, the second offered only 3 disabled computer users all of whom had visual impairments and used the same screen reader equipment. Due to the costs of holding focus groups, and the fact that the organisation could not provide the breadth of computer users with varying access equipment, it was decided not to engage the second organisation. This produced another problematic issue for the project, how to involve a wide variety of people who accessed the internet using differing methods. The means through which this was achieved became a snowballing sampling method (Mason 1996:103).
As has been already noted, one of the research team has a severe visual impairment and it was through personal contacts developed over previous years that the sample size was met and with the required variety of access methods to meet the research criteria. The geographic spread of the sample population together with problems of transport meant this larger group could not be drawn together for any focus group discussions. Instead, individual’s were asked to access the employment related websites and then provided with a series of questions relating to their experiences in using the sites. Any issues which arose with individual user testers were then resolved either through email correspondence or telephone. This additional source of research data was saved directly on computer or transcribed then saved for later analysis. Additionally, 12 organisations from the private, public, and not for profit sectors were invited to participate through semi structured interviews (Bryman and Burgess 1999).
The semi structured interview was used to enable a two way discourse to emerge between researcher and subject of research (Mishler 1986). General themes were introduced by researchers which enabled interviewees to expand on their understandings of the subject area, and also introduce alternative issues which they deemed relevant to the point in question. Hence although the interviewer provides the initial themes to be discussed, the semi structured approach allows interviewees to deviate into other areas which researchers may have either not considered important or simply missed. This allows research subjects the space to amend the research questioning into what they consider more relevant areas. By commencing semi structured interviews based on explicit themes also facilitates later analysis by introducing discreet sections for analysis.
Thus there are several different strands to methodology adopted for the research. The technical audit provides evidence of the degree of non compliance to accessibility guidelines. The involvement of disabled computer users allows a practical response to be developed regarding the affects non compliant websites have on different access methods. Interviews with professionals in industries concerned with developing websites provide an insight as to why inaccessible websites are produced, and examines the validity of arguments used. The final question which should be addressed is did the disabled researcher subjectively influence the project? That is, did his experiential knowledge of the topic area distort the research. The research is lead by disabled people and is guided and amended based on the comments and participation of ^ disabled computer users. Throughout the planning stages, disabled computer users were consulted and provided input which guided the methodology. This induces a continuous process of reflection and change (Trauth 1997), which helps mitigate any subjective bias by disabled researchers. In essence, the researchers apply reflexive practice by confronting one idea or train of thought with another (Alvesson and Skoldberg 2000:247).