Fable Announces Accessible Usability Scale to Enable Organizations to Measure the Experiences of Assistive Technology Users

The free tool is a modified System Usability Scale that can measure the experiences of those who use assistive technologies, for example people living with blindness who use screen readers.

Toronto, Canada – December 2, 2020 – Today Fable Tech Labs Inc. (“Fable”), a leading accessibility testing platform powered by people with disabilities, announced the launch of the Accessible Usability Scale (AUS) and made it freely available to all. ­­­ It is a tool that quantifies and measures the perceived user experiences of assistive technology users, to improve the usability of websites and apps and make them more accessible.

The AUS is based on the System Usability Scale (SUS). SUS was originally developed in 1986 and is a common psychometric tool to assess user experience. However, it doesn’t effectively measure the experiences of assistive technology users, such as people with disabilities who use screen readers or voice navigation.

Developed based on thousands of hours of engaging people with disabilities across more than 25 assistive technology configurations on Fable’s crowdtesting platform, the AUS adapts the original framework to measure usability issues for those who are impacted by accessibility.

Fable CEO Alwar Pillai said: “We made AUS free for everyone – because it can help. Regardless of what industry we are in, we can all agree that the experiences of people with disabilities on the internet can get a lot better. But we won’t get there unless we quantify the quality of those experiences.”

The Accessible Usability Scale consists of a brief survey of 10 alternating statements related to the user experience of an assistive technology user. AUS assigns a scale position for each possible response. The output of AUS is available after completion of the survey.

Samuel Proulx, blind since birth and now Fable’s Community Manager, said that “AUS is a critical step on the path to ensuring that people with disabilities are fully represented in digital product development. AUS enables designers and researchers to have a useful baseline tool to collect feedback from assistive technology users.  Thanks to AUS, our voices can be included and considered in ways that were previously lacking.”

To learn more, go to https://makeitfable.com/AUS.