Surveying People with Disabilities: Moving Toward Better Practices and Policies

This chapter examines how survey modes can help or hinder survey participation by individuals with disabilities. It also explores how to make surveys accessible to a wider audience, including people with hearing, sight, cognitive/intellectual, and mobility impairments. In this context, accessible means "usable by people with disabilities." Although it may seem like a simple concept, its implications are as varied and complex as are the needs of people with disabilities. The author's concern is with inclusion in all kinds of surveys, but much of their discussion in the chapter is focused on participation in web and other electronic surveys. The ways that people with disabilities can access information on the Internet vary greatly, according to their individual conditions. For the purposes of the chapter, disabilities are organized into the following categories: vision, hearing, combination blind and deaf, musculoskeletal or neurologic, learning and cognitive.