Editor’s note: This post is the first in a three-part series: Highlighting Accessibility

In recent years, accessibility has become an essential factor for teams tasked with bringing new products, services, and experiences to market. The reason for this is clear: design works best when it works for everyone. Historically, though, either out of ignorance or intention, we have often designed with the assumption that all users are alike in their abilities to perceive and interact, but more and more we’re recognizing that just like food & nutrition, humans vary considerably in their preferences and restrictions. 

To be fair, it is much easier to assume that our users are largely homogeneous; that they not only share the same preferences and goals but also their ability to achieve those goals. As we learn more about the nature of human cognition and interaction, we come to appreciate how a whole host of physical, mental, and even social characteristics can influence the fundamental ways we perceive the world.

So what is accessibility?

Broadly speaking, accessibility describes the degree to which something can be entered, or used. Architects and civil engineers have long incorporated things like wheelchair ramps, motion- or button-activated doors as ways to improve accessibility in the physical world; businesses often offer telecommunications devices for the deaf (TDD) capabilities for sales/customer services phone lines; car retailers offer vehicle modifications to make them wheelchair accessible and operable by persons with a whole range of physical disabilities. All of these enhancements are the result of the painstaking work by affected groups and their advocates toward gradual recognition of and empathy toward (and laws protecting) the varying needs of all human beings. 

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