Sage Journals Accessibility Guide

Last updated: 20 October 2022.

Welcome to the accessibility guide for Sage Journals. We frequently make improvements to make our site more accessible, so you may wish to bookmark this page and check back every now and then.

This page is intended as a user guide to the site's accessibility features. If you would like to request specific information on WCAG AA conformance and Section 508 compliance, you can message Sage's accessibility team at [email protected]. If you're interested in the accessibility of other Sage products and formats, or accessibility at Sage generally, see our global accessibility statement.

This document is also available as an accessible PDF. If you would like this document in an alternative format, or if you have any other questions about the accessibility of Sage Journals, contact us at [email protected].

Sage Journals content and alternative formats

The Sage Journals platform provides content through its interface, as well as offering a download option which automatically generates a PDF of the content. All content provided through the platform is DRM-free and there are no technical limitations placed on downloading or printing, though you should ensure that your use of the content is reasonable and complies with our Terms of Use. Should a qualified student require content from this site as an ePub or fully typeset PDF,

you can send an inquiry to [email protected]. We reply to all inquiries promptly, typically within five working days. If we do not have the file in-house we shall exercise reasonable efforts to have the file produced at no cost to the requestor. Please note this service may take 2-3 weeks. We are not able to provide articles in Word, HTML or XML format. PDFs obtained from Sage directly are also DRM-free (no password protection or print/copy restrictions) and permit magnification by the rendering application. Please note that accessible copies are issued for use by qualified students only.

Reading and viewing guidance – Sage Journals interface

Specific guidance for keyboard navigation

Skipping repetitive content

Sage Journals contains a 'Skip to main content' link on each page, which becomes visible when it receives focus. This link always appears as the first link on the page, so you can navigate to it by tabbing down once when the page loads or tabbing back up to the top of the page at any time. Clicking the link will bypass the site's navigation menus and move focus to the page's main content.

Video shortcuts

You can control videos on Sage Journals with your keyboard by using the tab key to navigate through the controls and the enter or space keys to click them. When you select the 'play video' button the following controls become available:

• Pause button: when selected , the video will pause and this button will toggle to become the 'play' button.
• Volume level / mute button: when selected, the video's audio will be muted and this button will toggle to become the 'volume level / unmute' button.
• Volume level: when focus is on this control, use the up or rightarrow key to increase the audio volume; use the down or left arrow key to decrease the audio volume.
• Progress slider: when focus is on this control, use the up or rightarrow key to skip forward 5 seconds; use the down or left arrow key to skip back 5 seconds.
• Fullscreen button: when selected, the video will enter fullscreen mode and this button will toggle to become the 'non-fullscreen’ button. You can also exit fullscreen mode by pressing the escape

Some embedded videos on Sage Journals are hosted by third parties, which often have their own features to support keyboard operation. For help with videos hosted on YouTube, for example, see using YouTube with a screen reader.

Podcast player

You can control podcasts on Sage Journals with your keyboard by using the tab key to navigate through the controls and the enter key to click them. The order of controls is as follows:

• Play: when selected, the podcast will play and this button will toggle to become the 'pause' button.
• Progress bar: this control is labelled as an empty internal link. Use the up or rightarrow key to skip forward 1 second; use the down or left arrow key to skip back 1 second. Use the pg up key to skip forward 5 minutes; use the pg down key to skip back 5 minutes. You can also return to the start of the podcast by pressing the home key or skip to the end by pressing the end

Specific guidance for visually impaired users

Reading order

Reading order usually follows the visual order of the content and uses a left-to-right, top-to-bottom convention.

Navigating by page section

Each page on Sage Journals is divided into landmarks so that the layout of the page can be perceived by assistive technologies. As well as using the skip link on each page to bypass repetitive elements, if you use a screen reader you can use these landmarks to scan and navigate the page. Useful landmarks include:

• Main: The main content of the page. Structurally, this is always the first landmark after the banner landmark.
• Navigation: Navigation elements, such as the browse menus and pagination links on search results pages.
• Region: The site also contains miscellaneous named regions, such as 'Also from Sage' which links to other Sage products, as well as video players present on the page.

Navigating by heading

Attention has been given to each page's semantic structure (i.e. its h1 to h6 tags) to ensure that headings are descriptive and useful. For instance, on search results pages each search result is marked with an h2 tag so you can easily skip through them.

Color contrast

All text on the platform meets minimum recommended contrast ratios against the background. This is 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text. If you still have trouble reading text on the site, the next section contains information about changing the text size. Alternatively, you may find it helpful to use a browser extension to specify your own color combinations, such as Change Colors for Chrome.

Limitations and exceptions.

• Some content, particularly older content, may contain figures and graphics (including images of text) that do not use sufficient color contrast, or use color as the only means of conveying information. If you find any graphics to be illegible, contact [email protected] and we will endeavor to update them.

Text size and magnification

You can change the size and style of text by altering the default fonts in your browser, or alternatively you can use your browser's zoom functionality. Sage Journals uses responsive design, so changing the zoom level in your browser will affect the layout of the page: as you zoom in or out, the page will rearrange itself to use your screen space in the best way.

PDFs downloaded from Sage Journals support zoom and magnification. As all PDFs have embedded, selectable text, all text can be reflowed in Adobe Acrobat Reader DC and other PDF readers.

Screen reader compatibility

Our site is designed to follow a logical reading order and semantic structure rather than work with any specific screen readers. However, we test our site with JAWS and NVDA, and the latest versions of Firefox and Chrome.

Text alternatives for visual content

Navigational images and icons, as well as many images in the content itself, contain useful alternative text. When alt text and long descriptions are available in the content, these are rendered in the interface. Some titles, particularly older ones, do not have text alternatives available for figures and other graphics. If you encounter an image that does not have a text alternative, and you need one, you can request alternative text for specific images by contacting [email protected].

Images that are decorative or incidental are given a 'null' alt attribute, so they are properly ignored by screen readers.

Limitations and exceptions.

• Automatically downloaded PDFs render alt text where available in the content, but do not render long descriptions.

MathML support

Article versions provided as basic EPUB3 via the Atypon eReader also include MathML=.

Limitations and exceptions.

• Downloadable PDFs does not support MathML, so equations in downloaded PDFs are rendered as images even when MathML is available. When reading content that is likely to contain equations, we recommend using the online interface instead.

Text-to-speech tools

All content on Sage Journals can be copied and pasted into a text-to-speech tool with no barriers.

Specific guidance for hearing impaired users

Podcast transcripts

Some podcasts have transcripts available. To check if a transcript is available for a given podcast, click on its title to go to the podcast's description.

Reading guidance - PDFs

We recommend that users will get the best experience if they read content directly on the Sage Journals interface. If you would rather read from the automatically generated PDF, you should bear the following in mind.

Limitations and exceptions.

• PDFs downloaded from the platform are not tagged for reading order, and so will follow the visual order. The main implication of this is that the page header and footer is read on each page.
• PDFs downloaded from the platform convert equations to plain text and do not render in MathML.
• PDFs downloaded from the platform inherit any structural or content issues mentioned above, such as unavailable alt text and untagged section headings.

How to contact us

If you have any comments, questions or feedback about the accessibility of Sage Journals, Sage's accessibility team would love to hear from you. You can contact us at [email protected]