mathematical figures accessibility csun 2014
DESCRIPTION
In Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) academic literature, mathematical formulae, diagrams and other two-dimensional structures are a critical information source (Sojka et al.). Even for many sighted students “math education poses a serious roadblock in entering technical disciplines” (Karshmer et al.). The outputs of mathematics literature could create even greater barriers to visually impaired students (Smeureanu et al.) and students with learning disabilities (Lewis and al.), due to the technical notations they include, the large number of visual resources used (such as diagrams, graphs and charts) and the inclusion of visual concepts, such as spatial concepts. Currently, the inclusion of visual information in academic research papers is a widespread practice. Efforts to convert academic literature in mathematics to accessible formats after their publication have been made (Sojka et al.). However, most research literature is not currently supported by a publishing process that produces accessible outputs of scientific documents (Gardner et al.). A solution for making the mathematics in electronic documents accessible is to provide alternative textual descriptions to critical graphical information (Webb), as the textual information can be rendered in speech by screen readers or in Braille. This solution “corresponds to the standard accessibility approach” (Cooper et al.) proposed by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines WCAG 1.0 and WCAG 2.0 (W3C). Several proposals exist on making standard statistical graphics accessible. Demir (Demir et al.) and Ferres (Ferres et al.) have applied statistical and natural language processing techniques for the generation of spoken descriptions of statistical graphics. Doush (Doush et al.) has proposed a multi-modal approach for accessing charts in Excel for visually impaired users. The National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM) has created guidelines on how to textually describe diagrams and other standard graphics within Digital Talking Books, with the aim of making them more accessible by for students or scientists who are blind or visually impaired. In this paper we aimed to review publishing practices, policies and submission guidelines concerning the accessibility of visual content in a sample of ten mathematics academic journals in mathematics. We checked the application of the accessibility policy in one article for from each journal. In particular, we focused our analysis on the alternative textual means of accessing the underlying semantics of figures. As noted by Cooper (Cooper et al.), the design of appropriate image textual descriptions of images is a challenging task and “this becomes more challenging as the complexity of the mathematics increases”. In order to address this issue, Splendiani (Splendiani et al.(a)) suggests that “the function of the text alternative can be accomplished by any textual description.TRANSCRIPT
Bruno Splendiani, Mireia Ribera, Miquel CentellesAdaptabit Group – University of Barcelona
CSUN Conference 2014
IntroductionOur workMethodologyResultsProposalConclusions
2“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014 3
In Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) academic literature, mathematical formulae, diagrams and other two-dimensional structures are a critical information source.
Source: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STEM_Magnet_Academy]
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Barriers to visually impaired students and students with learning disabilities in research literature
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
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Mathematics literature include
Sources: [1- 3 ]
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Solution for math notations: MATHML
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Source: [http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0166218X12002363]
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
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Sources: [1- 5 ]
What about graphics?
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
“If I can’t see the image I read its description”
8“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
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The image is…it shows…it represents…..???“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Readers Access to the content
Publishers fulfill accessibility regulations Comply with social responsibility Advantages in article retrieval
10“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
To review publishing practices, policies and submission guidelines concerning the accessibility of visual content in a sample of ten academic journals in mathematics.
To check the application of the accessibility policy in one article from each journal.
To analyze the alternative textual means of accessing the underlying semantics of figures.
11“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Where are the text alternatives?
In the image’s captions. In the surrounding/adjacent text. In the mentions of the image in main
text. In the image title. In the metadata.
12“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
ObjectivesTo foster the inclusion of
accessibility policies in the submission workflow of academic journals
To show the need for guidelines to standardize the submission of images in scientific papers.
13“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
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Accessibility policy?Submission policy and guidelines for visual
content?
Top ten journals in mathematics in JCR
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Journal of the American Mathematical Society Communications on Pure and Applied Mathematics Annals of Mathematics Acta Mathematica Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society Inventiones Mathematicae Foundations of Computational Mathematics Journal of the European Mathematical Society Publications Mathématiques de l'IHÉS Fixed Point Theory and Applications
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One article for each journal in PDF versionAre figures “readable”?
Image formatColor contrast and coding Label font type and sizeMinimum resolution Minimum dimensions
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
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What is in image-related text?
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
No journal had an accessibility policy statement.
Only two journals made a reference to the inclusion of descriptive captions of figures in their submission guidelines.
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Visual elements in mathematics papers have peculiar characteristics and treatment compared to figures in papers of other research areas, like Medicine, Biology, Computer Science. Preferential use of vector format rather than the
raster format. Usually, the figures are considered as part of the
text. Fonts preferences mismatch with accessibility
requirements. NO content semantic descriptors in XMP metadata
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Vector images in PDF = content stream in object
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No alternative/ functional actual text
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Raster images not tagged in PDF
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No alternative/actual text
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014 21
Source: Bogomolov et al.
Two frequent disappointing decisions concerning the fonts in formulae:
Usually, the label font size in formulae is lower than 12 pt.
Usually, the font family in formulae is the serif one… since it is recommended by the ISO International Standard 80000-:2009.
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014 22
NO content semantic descriptors in XMP metadata
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24“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Good practices documented in journal policy
Good practices applied in paper
Vector format 10 9Color alone 2 8Color Contrast 2 7Combination of colors 2 8Minimum resolution 5 0Minimum dimensions 3 0Font type sans-serif 2 0Minimum Font size 4 0Alt/actual text (PDF) 0 0Caption 5 8Mention(s) 2 7Metadata 0 2
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Lack of consistency between image submission policies and their application
The practices do not fulfill basic recommendations on accessibility
Images lack alternative descriptionsVisual information of scientific articles is
not accessible to people with visual disabilities
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Promote the inclusion of alt text (and other accessibility issues) in the publishing workflowRecommendations in submission
systemAutomatic alt text checkAutomatic image check (contrast,
resolution, font size..)
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
Provide solutions for avoiding the loss of semantic data associated with figures during the transformation from original LaTex documents to the final publication PDF documents.
Research opportunities: About the metadata workflow. About the adaptation of Image Processing
and Interchange Standard (IPI)
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Metadata management in the publishing workflow
How are metadata and image annotations created and transmitted from initial submission to article publication?
Is image metadata in mathematics publications preserved throughout its lifecycle?
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
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Lack of common and clearly defined guidelines addressing accessibility issues related to figures in highly cited mathematics journals.
High variability in the application of recommendations related to graphical features and textual alternatives to the figures in PDF articles.
We propose to improve image accessibility in mathematics by promoting the inclusion of alternative text in publishers guidelines and authors practices.
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
1. Fedor Nazarov, Dmitry Ryabogin and Artem Zvavitch , An asymmetric convex body with maximal sections of constant volume, J. Amer. Math. Soc. 27 (2014), 43-68
2. Grégory Miermont, The Brownian map is the scaling limit of uniform random plane quadrangulations, Volume 10, issue 2. June 2013
3. Mladen Bestvina , Geometric group theory and 3 manifolds hand in hand: the fulfillment of Thurston's vision, Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 51 (2014), 53-70
4. Jonathan D. Hauenstein and Charles W. Wampler, Isosingular Sets and Deflation, Foundations of Computational MathematicsThe Journal of the Society for the Foundations of Computational MathematicsVolume 13, Issue 3. June 2013
5. Piotr Mackowiak, The existence of equilibrium in a simple exchange model, Fixed Point Theory and Applications 2013, 2013:104
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Common set of international guidelines
for image submission
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014
ISO 80000-2:2009
WCAG 2.0
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Start from existing guidelines on image description
“Are figures accessible in mathematics academic journals?” - CSUN 2014