Tiny cell keyboards are a barrier to senior citizen texting, calling
by Russell Shaw
I spent much of last weekend’s Thanksgiving holiday at the home of my girlfriend’s 75 year-old mother and dear 82-year-old Dad.
Over the weekend, my girlfriend’s sister and brother-in-law bought their (and my girlfriend’s) Mom a cell phone.
After unboxing the phone and playing with it awhile, my girlfriend’s Mom complained loudly to all within shout of her voice that the phone keys were too small for her arthritic hands.
That comment then got me thinking: are these tiny new cellphones making it even more difficult for seniors with motion, mobility and vision problems to text?
What about arthritis, Parkinson’s, macular degeneration? Kind of ironic here that the people who need cell phones the most- for emergency purposes- would have to be subject to these kinds of usability issues?
Not only text, but make phone calls as well? I mean, well duh, that’s what you are supposed to do with a phone, right?
Maybe the answer is larger keyboard phones that would be simpler to type on. Ready-made analogy- large-type books for the visually impaired.
Hey, our seniors raised us. Don’t we owe them?
