Closed Captioning Matters: An Examination of the Use of Captioning for All Students

Lyman Dukes IIICasey Frechette

University of South Florida St. Petersburg

Session Objectives

• Discuss Legislation Impacting Captioning• Discuss Literature on Captioning• Discuss One Institution’s Experience with

Captioning• Discuss Your Experiences with Captioning• Discuss Conclusions and Next Steps

Project Background

• Students are selecting online courses

If given a choice, which course type would you rather take?Face-to-face 32%Hybrid 27%Online 41%

I would like to see more online courses available at USFSP.

Yes, definitely 68%

Neutral 29%

No, we seem to have enough 3%

Project Background

• Online course offerings are on the increase• Captioning is provided per accommodation

request• Court rulings appear to indicate otherwise• The institution’s Accessibility Committee

initiated a pilot study to examine the cost and benefit of captioning all online course video content

Goals of the Study

• Do students use captions, if included in online course video content?

• If students use captioning, do students indicate benefit from the use of captions included in online course video content?

• If benefit is noted, what benefits do students report?• Is there benefit for other campus constituents?• What are the typical costs for captioning online

course video content?

Legislation says

• Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, requires that electronic and information technologies are accessible to persons with disabilities if procured, developed, maintained, or used by federal agencies.

(Burgstahler, 2002)

Legislation says

• Title II of the ADA requires that communications with persons with disabilities must be as effective as communications with others.– The OCR indicated ‘as effective as’ includes:• Timeliness of delivery• Accuracy of the translation• Provision of content in a manner and medium appropriate

to the message significance and ability of the individual(OCR, 2003)

Legislation says

• The DOJ takes the position that the ADA applies to online communication.– The DOJ stated: “Covered entities under the ADA are

required to provide effective communication regardless of whether they generally communicate through print media, audio media, or computerized media such as the Internet. Covered entities that use the Internet for communications regarding their programs, goods, or services must be prepared to offer those communications through accessible means as well.” (Patrick, 1996)

Office of Civil Rights says

• “The courts have held that a public entity violates its obligations under the ADA when it only responds on an ad-hoc basis to individual requests for accommodation”

(Distance Education Accessibility Guidelines Task Force, 2011, p. 9)

In sum

• Access does not equal compliance, but effectiveness of the access – timeliness, accuracy, and appropriateness – must be addressed. (Carnevale, 1999)

Court Rulings say

• A recent ruling impacting several California institutions has been interpreted to mean all audio and video content must be captioned prior to being made available.

Court Rulings say

• Other charges relative to online course accessibility have been brought against:– Northwestern University– New York University– Penn State University– Louisiana Tech University– Florida State University

Our Position, not necessarily the position of the Institution

• It’s the most ethical approach – A course experience should be the same for students with or without a disability

• Universal Design approaches should be applied whenever reasonable and appropriate

• Improving access may improve student success and retention rate

• We are legally obliged

The Evolution of Captioning

• 1972 – Open captioning was used in TV programming for the first time in the U.S.

• 1976 – FCC approved closed captioning• Captioning is now commonplace in the TV environment• Literature on distance education often addresses ‘access’

however, often not in terms of persons with disabilities• Distance education faces a journey similar to that of

captioning for TV

(Carroll & McLaughlin, 2005)

The Evolution of Distance Learning

• Correspondence Courses • Televised Courses • E-mail driven online courses • Web-based online courses

(Burgstahler, 2002)

Literature Says

• For Students Diagnosed– Students with hearing impairments most often

report issues with the inaccessibility of audio/video material (Fichten et al., 2009)

• Students with disabilities face a ‘second digital divide’ (Burgstahler, 2002)

• Visual text alternatives for audio information and complex sentence structures are barriers (Lang & Steely, 2003)

Literature Says

• For Students not Diagnosed– ‘Provides an additional level of comprehensive

input when learning a new language’ – ‘Yielded more positive attitudes and improved

vocabulary’– ‘Improved vocabulary, reading comprehension,

word analysis skills, and increased motivation in a remedial reading course’

Literature Says

• For Students not Diagnosed– Students in a foreign language course indicated

they used captions to:• Increase attention• Improve language processing• Reinforce previous knowledge• Analyze the language

– Students in Science• ‘Low performers’ used captions to achieve scores

similar to ‘high-performers’

Method

• Research Setting– USFSP is part of the USF system and has

approximately 6,500 full- and part-time students– We are an urban campus in downtown St.

Petersburg– In typical semesters approximately 25% of our SCH

is generated thru online courses

USF St. Petersburg

Method

• Courses: Law and Business I / Introduction to Psychology

• Module content: Full Length Lecture Capture Method – Instructor and any presentation visual on screen

• Module Lecture Length:– Law and Business I – 99 minutes– Introduction to Psychology – 108 minutes

• Setting: Lectures filmed in distance learning studio with a live audience of 32 students in each course

Method

• All videos delivered via VideoJS, an open-source HTML5 video player

• Advantages– Place captions below videos– Customize font for maximum readability– Provide option to turn captions off– Provide other playback controls– Option to track student interactions with controls

Method

Method

• Captions were enabled by default• Captions could be copied and pasted• Videos appeared at a size of 720x440 but

could be made full screen

Method

Method

Instruments

• 12-item survey administered at the end of the semester– Perceived extent of caption usage– Attitudes toward captioning– Other experiences with closed captioning– Disability status

Quantitative Analysis

• Categorical data were tabulated and descriptive statistics were calculated– Portion of students with self-identified disabilities– Perceived helpfulness of captions– Perceived extent of caption usage

Qualitative Analysis

• Open-ended responses to how captions helped or hurt were coded using the Glaser-Strauss constant comparison method (1967)

– 56 responses, from three to 63 words in length– Comments were categorized by comparing

remarks to existing “good fits”– Properties that defined categories were identified

to turn “collections” into “constructs” (Lindlof, 1995)

Discussion

86%

13%

1%

How Students Reported Their Disability Status

No Reported Disability (86%)Reported & Not Regis-tered with Disability Services (13%)Reported & Registered with Disability Services (1%)

Discussion

49%

35%

10%

5%

1%

How Helpful Students Found Closed Captioning

Extremly helpful (49%)Very helpful (35%)Moderately helpful (10%)Slightly helpful (5%)Not helpful (1%)

Discussion

67%

15%

10%

2%6%

How Often Students Used Closed Captioning

Always (67%)Often (15%)Sometimes (10%)Seldom (2%)Never (6%)

Discussion

• Student BenefitClarification• Students sometimes had difficulty hearing the

instructor.– “Closed captions helped me because I was able to read and

process what was being said a little easer.”– “I used it in case I missed something the instructor said, I

could pause and still see what was said.”– “I was able to see exactly what the professor was saying …”

Discussion

• Student BenefitComprehension• Students treated captions as a core delivery method,

not just a supplement to the audio content– “They made the information easier to learn because I am

more of a visual learner”– “The closed captions helped me when viewing the videos at

home, because I have small children and at times they can be loud.”

– “The closed captions helped me because it’s not my first language.”

Discussion

• Student BenefitSpelling of Keywords• Students appreciated seeing the spelling of unfamiliar

words– “If the professor said a word I didn’t understand I’d go back

and read the caption.”– “There were many legal terms that I did not know of and the

captions helped me learn how to spell them.”– “It helped me spell certain words that were important in the

lecture.”

Discussion

• Student BenefitNote Taking• Students reported using captions as a note taking tool

– “They helped because when I was taking notes I was able to pause the video and use the captions rather than rewind and repeat the video.”

– “It was extremely helpful and I took tons of notes.”– “I could pause and just copy the caption.”

Discussion

• Student BenefitOther Potential Benefits … but don’t quote us!• Business Law I – Student course grades with closed

captioning were slightly higher than without• Introduction to Psychology – Student course grades

with closed captioning were more than 7% higher than without

Discussion

• Student Hindrance– Three students reported seeing words that ran

together without spaces– Two additional students cited accuracy issues with

the captions

Discussion

• Faculty Benefit – Law and Business I – Student evaluations ratings

increased in 8 of 8 categories– Introduction to Psychology – Student evaluation

ratings increased in 6 of 8 categories

Discussion

• Faculty Benefit– One of the instructors stated “I was thrilled to be

able to offer the on/off captioning option to my students. I really liked that the students could turn off the captioning option if they found it distracting. I have had several students tell me that they like the closed-captioning feature.”

Discussion

• Institutional Benefit– Improved course satisfaction among students– Improved student success– Improved retention rates

Discussion

• Cost Analysis– $150 per hour for transcription / provision of

caption and transcript files• Other vendors had similar rates

Discussion

• Other Options– Speech-to-Text Software• Examples

– Dragon Naturally Speaking– Camtasia speech-to-text capability

– Captionist Position• Approximately $42,000 per year / $20 per hour

Conclusions

• Educate Administrators• Educate and Train Professors• Educate and Train Students• Develop and Adopt e-learning / accessibility

Guidelines• Convene a campus accessibility committee• Further Research

Please share your experiences with captioning at your institution

and ask any questions you may have.

References• Burgstahler, S. (2002). Distance Learning: Universal Design, Universal Access.

AACE Journal, 10(1), 32-61. Norfolk, VA: AACE.• Carnevale, D. (1999, October 29). Colleges strive to give disabled students

access to on-line courses. Chronicle of Higher Education, 46(10), Retrieved May 22, 2014, from http://chronicle.com/article/Colleges-Strive-to-Give/13474

• Carrol, J., McLaughlin, K. (2005). Closed captioning in distance education, Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, Vol. 20, Issue 4, 183 – 189.

• Distance Education Accessibility Guidelines Task Force. California Community Colleges, (2011). Distance education accessibility guidelines for students with disabilities. Retrieved from website: http://www.grossmont.edu/accessibility/docs/Distance_Education_Accessibility_Guidelines_2011.pdf

• Fichten, C.S., Ferraro, V., Asuncion, J.V., Chwojka, C., Barile, M., Nguyen, M.N., Klomp, R. & Wolforth, J. (2009). Disabilities and e-Learning Problems and Solutions: An Exploratory Study. Educational Technology & Society, 12(4), 241-256.

References• Glaser, B. G., & Strauss, A. L. (1967). The discovery of grounded

theory: Strategies for qualitative research. Chicago: Aldine.• Lang, H.G. & Steely, D. (2003). Web-Based Science Instruction for

Deaf Students: What Research Says to the Teacher. Instructional Science: An International Journal of the Learning Sciences, 31(4), 277.

• Lindof, T. R. (). Qualitative communication research methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

• Patrick, D. US Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division. Letter of September 9, 1996 addressed to to senator tom harkin of iowa. Retrieved from website: http://www.justice.gov/crt/foia/readingroom/frequent_requests/ada_tal/tal712.txt

Thank you very much for sharing your time with us.

ldukes@usfsp.edufrechette@usfsp.edu