Informing Flexible Abbreviation Expansion for Users with Motor Disabilities

In this paper we present results and conclusions of an initial study, intended to inform the design of a system to automatically reconstruct full sentences from abbreviated typed text. Such a system will reduce the number of keystrokes that cognitively-unimpaired users with motor disabilities need to input in order to communicate in full, rich language. A number of techniques for abbreviating messages have been identified, based on empirical studies of users. These include vowel deletion, phonetic replacement, and word truncation. How such techniques might be used to support users with motor disabilities is considered and further empirical work proposed.