Accessible cell phone design: development and application of a needs analysis framework.

Abstract

This research describes the development and use of the Needs Analysis and Requirements Acquisition (NARA) framework to elicit and construct user requirements for the design of cell phones (which are a type of assistive technology) that are both usable and accessible to persons with disabilities. Semi-structured interviews and a focus group were used to elicit information and a systematic approach was used to translation information into requirements (construct). Elicitation and construction are the first two stages of NARA. Requirements for general and feature-specific phone attributes were identified, and several requirements were found to match six of the seven universal design principles. The study demonstrated that NARA is both a straight-forward and cost-effective method to develop user requirements and can be used throughout the development cycle.