explaining the problem with coping.

Hi FolksHere is a explanation and some research on why some of us can not copy accurately . 


Most people reading this  have a working visual memory. you can close your eyes and picture the word "and"  or picture a letter. some people such as myself , can not do that. It is one of the issues for some dyslexics (although not all). You can find the sources and studies for this in an email I wrote previously

So I can not close my eyes and picture details like a letter. some people with week visual memory try to picture them or remember details, such as they are tall or have a round shape near the line. That is why, when they transcribe them they are likely to get the ball bit in the wrong place, such as confusing a "b" and "d" or "p" (contributing to the myth that dyslexics see things backwards - we see things ok, we just can not remember what they look like) (BTW from what I remember about 40 % of dyslexics have good visual memory so this is not true for all of us)


Unfortunately, and also common for dyslexics , my auditory memory and recognition is also well below average (at about the 5-10% mark on the Gaussian curve). So even using text to speech will not help me much for this type of task. This is also one of the common issues for many dyslexics.


Covering each letter after i type each character works for coping my credit card number off my credit card but not on my phone due to the parallax. (what character is covered depends on what angle you are looking at it.) There are some hacks I can do, but these tend to brake security, so I won't detail them here. They also will not work as well if there is a limited time frame and are a bit complex, so not everyone can figure them out.


Fortunately,  I have above average maths and analytical skills. so I remember my cell phone number as two mathematical sequences and stories.  However i can not do this with all the passwords and short term numbers people want me to remember. The point is, just because someone does not have a good visual memory and auditory memory does not mean they can not be using the rest of your content. 


The memory skills discussed above are both parts of short term memory which is reduced also in early stages of dementia. They will be affected by a mix of  impaired working memory (holding on to more then one item of information at the same time) attention and executive function {2} -  so that will rule out the coping skills I have developed for myself. Even with much better functioning then dementia, I often get locked out of sites and regularly go to the bank, and weight in line for a new password (about every third try) unless I ask someone to do it for me.

Hope it makes more sense now
All the best ....Lisa Seeman



{2} the following sources may be helpful about dementia , i have just scanned them due to time 
https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/122/3/383/527986
from https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/122/3/383/527986
 (McKhann et al., 1984; Grady et al., 1988; Welsh et al., 1992; Hodges and Patterson, 1995


{1}visual memory and dyslexia
The original email is at https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-gl/2001AprJun/0437.html with full citation information 
some relevant exerts :
on visual memory and process- (main school of research  Livingstone (1993) and Martin and Lovegrove
1988)  )(see   9, 15) Dyslexics have reduced synaptic activity in the V5 area V5 is part of the broader "magnocellular -- large cell -- system" that
processes fast-moving objects, and brightness contrasts. One interpretatiois that a specific magnocellular cell type develops abnormally in people
with dyslexia (3).


on auditory discrimination - (main research - see Tallal et all (32) ) This body of research has shown that many dyslexics have defects in the left auditory cortex (responsible for sound naming and identification) and temporal processing. 


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