Colour dependent UI elements and colour vision

deficiency: a need for integrating alternatives.

Abstract

This paper aims to study and analyse the existing solutions provided in mobile phones, that claim to help

compensate for colour vision deficiency. A significant subset of mobile phone users have some form of

colour vision deficiency- a group of conditions that affect the perception of colour. To facilitate accessibility,

colour corrective modes are seen as a common tool. These colour corrective modes are only static- they alter

colours based on an algorithmic average. It is not inclusive of the ranging severity of colour vision

deficiency. Colour corrective modes uniformly alter all visual information on a screen, including elements

which users are familiar with. Using qualitative research methods, such as- record keeping, interviews, case

study research, it was ascertained that these modes do not account for the calculative process that colour

vision deficient people follow. Moreover, calibration of these modes proved to be affecting the usability and

user satisfaction when subjected to multiple use cases. Cognition of people with this condition, differs

significantly from people who have normal colour vision. This is apparent in the process of identification and

differentiation of colours, as they rely entirely on cognitive factors such as- experience, association, memory,

and other non chromatic cues. These factors are conflicted by colour corrective modes as they isolate altered

all visual information on a particular mobile phone screen. It was inferred that problem of colour vision

deficiency, needs to be approached as a condition that affects decision-making when the tasks rely on colour

to transmit information. This approach would focus on easing the tasks that pose as a challenge to people

with colour vision deficiency while preserving their perceptual learning. To ensure effectiveness,

accessibility needs to be validated, and evaluated, at every stage of the process of developing a tool for any

disability. The paper concludes with suggestions for future work, which could potentially be used for the next

research cycle.

Keywords: Colour vision deficiency, accessibility, colour corrective modes, usability, calculative process,

cognition, perceptual learning

Related work

In order to get a deeper understanding of the subject, it is important to look at pre-existing literature in this

field. Several solutions have been brought into practice that cover the aspects of re-colouring, colour

identification and contrasting for supporting people with colour vision deficiency or colour blindness. A lot

of these studies have mentioned ‘colour correction’ modes, and its usability as an accessibility feature.

However, these studies predominantly use quantitative methods for their research and analysis.

Colour Perception

Colour perception involves the eye and nervous system. In the human eye, there are photosensitive cells in

the retina, called cones. They receive the stimulus from light, translating it into chemical signals. Then,

neurological structures conduct such signals to the brain. There are three types of cones: S-cones (blue-

cones), which are light sensitive to small wavelengths; M-cones (green- cones), which are sensitive to

medium wavelengths; and L-cones (red-cones), which are sensitive to long wavelengths. The perception of

colour results from blending those three signals of distinct wavelengths into a single signal. When human

colour perception works well by combining small, medium, and long wavelength signals, we are in the

presence of a colour-normal trichromat person (or merely a trichromat) who perceives all colours of the

visible spectrum, yet they are only capable of distinguishing about 700 different tones.

However, not all people perceive colour as a trichromat individual. Colour vision deficiency (CVD), also

known as colourblindness or daltonism, can be acquired by way of trauma, brain fever, disorders,

degenerations, dystrophy or diseases of different origin. Nevertheless, the most common CVD type

originates in genetic alterations of cone cells. Depending on the number of affected colour channels, we can

classify CVD into three main categories

• Anomalous trichromacy - In this case, the curve of the sensitivity of one type of cone cells shifts

from its regular position, which distorts colour perception, although the colour gamut is mostly the

same as for people without CVD.

• Dichromacy - The colour space of a dichromat individual is two dimensional, because they only own

cones of two types, that is, cones of the third type are missing or do not function at all; consequently,

his/her perceived colour spectrum substantially is reduced.

 • Monochromacy - In this case,two or even three types of cones are missing or do not work at all.

Consequently, colour vision relies on rods, which allow for grayscale vision. That is, the colour

space of a monochromat individual is one dimensional.

Proportion of people with CVD/ colour-blindness

Colour vision deficiency or colour blindness, represents a group of conditions that affect the perception of

colour. It is stated that 96% of the population have normal colour vision. Whereas, 8% (1 in 12) of males,

and 0.5% (1 in 200) females are partially or completely colour vision impaired.

Effects of CVD in daily life

It is common knowledge that people with colour vision impairment face difficulties while interpreting

information that relies solely or dominantly on colour. A notable example would be traffic lights, ease in

decoding the information presented by the traffic signal, can vary from case-to-case. If we assume that all

three lights look identical when not illuminated, a person with such a condition would either rely on the

placement of these lights, i.e., the top one is ‘stop,’ the middle one is ‘wait’ and the bottom one is ‘go,’ or on

other non-chromatic cues.

Existing solutions, effectiveness and flexibility

Our methodology addresses the inability of colour adaptation methods in preserving the perceptual learning

of CVD people. For example, a deuteranope-type dichromat person sees an orange in faded green, so it is not

a good idea to re-color it in blue, because his/her perceptual experience tell him/her that an orange is not a

blue piece of fruit. So, the following perceptual requirements must be satisfied to preserve the perceptual

learning:

• Colour naturalness - Preserving colour naturalness means minimising the perceptual difference between an

original colour and the colour after adaptation. This requirement allows us to not break up with the

perceptual learning of the colourblind.

• Colour consistency - Preserving colour consistency means that a given colour is always remapped to the

same colour, independently of the set of colours subject to remapping. Otherwise, we cannot avoid some

disorientation in the perception of the colourblind.

• Colour contrast - In the process of colour adaptation, preserving or enhancing colour contrast is essential to

be able to distinguish adjacent objects in a given image. Sometimes, it is even necessary to identify objects

seen as a single object by a CVD person.

Recolouring algorithms are used to create ‘colour correction’ modes for different types of colourblind users

and are provided in most mobile operating systems. These predefined modes have to be adapted manually by

the user. Studies conducted by other researchers have proved this method may result in increased user

satisfaction. However, these modes are rigid, which is the antithesis of colour-blindness, since

colourblindness can vary in kind; and ranges in severity. With this, a need for dynamic UIs or adaptive UIs is

expressed by the researchers. However, there is a dearth of qualitative reasoning in these suggestions. The

usability evaluations carried out in these studies, use game applications as tasks to gauge usability of ‘colour

correction’ modes and adaptive user interfaces. Credibility of these results may fall short, since they do not

specify the usability in regular, day-to-day usage.

Evaluating usability through colour dependent games, point to efficiency, effectiveness and satisfaction

levels of a specific use case, i.e., ‘usability of colour correction modes and adaptive colour correction mode

in colour dependent games.’ These tests do not speak for the overall usability of colour correction modes and

adaptive colour correction mode. To form a detailed conclusion on these parameters, more use cases need to

be evaluated, with emphasis on ‘duration of use, and its effects.’

The Problem

The condition of colourblindness or colour vision deficiency poses challenges in the lives of people who are

impaired with this condition. Since there is no cure for inherited colour vision deficiency, people with this

condition rely on assistance to overcome challenges that involve colour. This assistance can be provided to

them personally, i.e., through a person with normal colour vision, perceptual learning, and visual cues other

than colour (non chromatic cues). In the context of mobile phones and other digital devices, namely, tablets,

computers, and laptops, ‘colour correction’ is a common accessibility feature that uses recolouring

algorithms to compensate for colourblindness. However, these recolouring methods work in a pixel-wise

manner, without considering any semantics about the contents of the input image. The paper critiques this

approach through explaining the common recolouring methods:

 LMS Based Methods

Colour consistent (yes), Colour naturalness (no), colour contrast (yes)

Its idea is to use the information lost in the simulation of colour blindness and use LMS colour space to

compensate colours missing in each group/type of cones, long (L), medium (M), and short (S) in order to be

predictable to the viewer and provide accurate results.

• Protanopia: LMS>CBFS - only changes colour of confusing areas with no change in the brightness and

saturation.

• Duteronopia: LAB>LMS

• Tritanopia: Shifting colour and LMS may cause confusion

RGB (Red, Green, Blue) Based Methods

Colour consistency (yes), Colour natural (no), Colour contrast( yes)

This colour compensation method is only for those with weak red vision (i.e., protan people). It builds upon

the fact that protan people perceive better the dark, saturated red shades than dull, light red shades. This fact

explains why they compressed the range of reds (R channel), i.e., about 20% less of red value; this is valid

for all colours with some amount of R. Therefore, all the pixels with some red are subject to recolouring.

That is, all pixels without any red (R = 0) remain unchanged in the recolouring process

HSV (Hue, Saturation, Value) Based Methods

(Increasing saturation) Colour consistency (yes), Colour natural (yes), Colour contrast (yes),

(Change hue, while leaving V and S same) Colour consistency (yes), Colour natural (no), Colour contrast

(yes)

This method applies to both anomalous trichromacy and dichromacy. It is compensation recolouring method

by remapping the hue components in the HSV colour space. The saturation (S) and luminance (V)

components remain unchanged to guarantee the naturalness of the re-coloured image as much as possible,

because they are not the main contributors to colour confusion of CVD people. The remapping of the hue

components in the HSV colour space is performed using a histogram transformation, which has the effect of

enhancing the hue contrast.




The problem with this method is layered. Most importantly, ‘colour correction’ modes disregard the

perceptual learning and cognition factors in colour identification of colour blind people. Furthermore, use of

the term ‘colour colour correction’ is misleading.

How it disregards the perceptual learning and cognition of colour blind people:

• People with colour vision deficiency or colour blindness, rely on perceptual learning to identify

colours which has been developed through their experience and learning. For example - grass is

green because they were taught that this is what green looks like. Changing their perception of

colour can affect their cognition.

• Barriers a digital device, for a person with CVD or colourblindness are predominantly limited to

colour coded information or decision points that rely on colour. Therefore, changing the entire colour

gamut or colour scheme of the screen is wasteful.

• Colour vision deficiency varies in kind and ranges in severity. Having static modes, disregards the

ranging nature of CVD.

• People with colour vision deficiency might not be aware of the details of their specific conditions,

like - severity and the kind of colour vision deficiency. Therefore, modes can be restrictive.

• Isolating ‘colour correction’ on a particular display can cause confusion, since they rely heavily upon

perceptual learning to identify colours.

• Effective duration of exposure to such interfaces has not been gauged

How is ‘colour correction’ misleading?















• The term sets the wrong context- users turn on the mode expecting it to “correct” their vision, i.e

make them see colours the way an able visioned person would.

• In reality, the mode only facilitates the functional differentiation of colour and isn’t a true

representation of how the colour looks.

• This key insight isn’t communicated to the users effectively with the name of the modes- which

leads to some amount of confusion.