Below is a summary of advice regarding web design for dyslexic’s from 456 Berea Street.

User Interface Concepts

• Graphics are really helpful for supporting an idea by aiding comprehension.
• Animated images may make a page unusable to the dyslexic viewer because they are very distracting on the eye.  (Possibly allow users to control the animation)
• Consider breaking complex pages down into a few pages to avoid information overload.
• Simple navigation which includes a home page (back to the start) item is important to aid easy navigation. Many dyslexics have a poor sense of direction.

Design & text attributes

• Ensure that foreground and background colour combos provide sufficient contrast.
• Larger text is easier to read.
• Shorter text length and narrower text columns make reading easier
• Increasing line-height to 1.3em makes it easier for dyslexic readers to read longer lines of text
• San Serif fonts (although the site above is serif)
• Helps to decrease the letter spacing but increase the word spacing (dyslexic users have some trouble recognising where words begin and end)
• Justified disrupts word spacing making it more difficult (visual distraction for reader = loosing their place).
• Use italics sparingly

Copy considerations

• Abbreviated text makes it harder – always provide the full term initially with the abbreviation immediately after in first instance
• Write in simple short sentences
• Some dyslexics use screen readers to help them read.