By the Numbers: Results from A Quantitative Study of Health Information User Experience in People with and Without Disabilities

People with and without disabilities sought information online during the initial onset of COVID-19 during the official public health emergency from March 2020 to May 2023. After the public health emergency ended, though, there has been little information to assess the user experience of online health information seeking with respect to COVID-19, which remains a public health concern, in people with and without disabilities. The goal of this research is to assess the extent to which online content about COVID-19 is both usable and satisfying to people with disabilities and compare this to people without disabilities. A cross-sectional survey was used for this purpose. Results indicate that people with disabilities are more likely to find online content either unusable or dissatisfying compared to people without disabilities. Further work should recruit from a more racially and socio-economically diverse participant pool. Further work should also involve qualitative research with technology users with disabilities assessing specific challenges they may encounter.