Engineering and psychological principles of alternative text organization in digital environments of cultural institutions

This study examines the principles of organizing alternative text (Alt-text) in digital environments, using the website of the Russian Museum as a case study. The research analyzes the cognitive aspects of Alt-text perception among visually impaired users and explores methods for optimizing audio descriptions for this user group. An experimental study involving 88 respondents confirmed the hypothesis that emotionally expressive Alt-text is perceived more comprehensively by visually impaired individuals compared to neutral descriptions. A positive correlation was identified between the degree of comprehension of the description and the number of epithets used by respondents when recalling the content (r = 0.52). Based on the findings, recommendations have been developed for creating accessible Alt-text to enhance the inclusivity of cultural institution websites. These recommendations include identifying and describing the primary compositional element, providing descriptions of secondary elements and the background, and conveying the sensory experience evoked by the image.