We’ve just bought a new doorbell. It was about time. The old one worked intermittently and if I was upstairs at the back of the house, as I often am, I couldn’t hear it. I’ve been complaining about it for months if not years, and my husband jumped into action at last when I asked for a new one as an anniversary present.
I don’t think he took the anniversary present request seriously, but he did get my sense of frustration. The new doorbell was ordered straight away. It’s one of those with a camera and a link to your phone and since he is better placed skill-wise to deal with it than I, its installation was in his hands. Last night he started to set it up. I crept out, leaving him about to explode on the sofa at the tortuous process this entailed.
I know I complain about tiny instruction leaflets designed by teenagers with 20:20 vision, but at least, once you’ve dug out the magnifying glass, they do give you some indication of where you’re heading. The doorbell instructions had a QR code to scan to get you started, and no further directions until you’d completed the current step. For those of us who like to know where we’re going before we set off, that’s infuriating.
Imprecise instructions are a constant issue for me. I so often find myself saying that this or that guide couldn’t possibly have been written by an autistic person. I find frequently that key steps are missing. It’s like having a map with only half the places on your route actually visible. The author of the guide seems to have an end point in mind, but has not thought through how to get there. “Start from Brighton and turn left in Edinburgh”. No landmarks, distances or arrival time estimate.
Reacquainting myself recently with my grownup camera after a break, I consulted its ‘handbook’, the kind that has half a dozen pages for each language and looks encyclopaedic until you open it. The handbook tells me that in auto mode I can easily access what it calls ‘live guides’. “Set the mode dial to auto, and touch the tab to display live guides”, it says. What tab? I am still looking for it. I can find no indication of where it is in the diagram of the camera on this page. You see what I mean? In the end, a German expert on YouTube got me back on track. My husband suggests that my biggest disadvantage is not being a toddler.
What can we do about this? Well, I recently listened to an episode of Michael Rosen’s Word of Mouth on BBC Radio 4. It was about audio description for visually impaired people in spaces like theatres and museums. As well as an audio describer, one participant is herself visually impaired and trains organisations (and audio describers) in how best to make their work or their space accessible and enjoyable. You can hear the episode here if you’re interested.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001p1s7?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile
It seems to me that the authors of instruction leaflets, guidebooks and manuals would do well to have them proof-read by an autistic person. Our need for precision would ensure we find the gaps that when filled would make sense of their work.
Despite his frustration, my other half has installed the doorbell and it’s working. I can’t help thinking he could have done it more easily with better instructions.
