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Accessibility statement

Reference Global is committed to ensuring that our platform is accessible to all users, regardless of ability or technology. As part of Paradigm Publishing Services, a division of De Gruyter Brill, we share the wider company’s commitment to inclusive design and equal access to scholarly knowledge. We are continuously working to improve the accessibility and usability of reference-global.com.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) standards are set by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the main international standards organization for the Internet. These guidelines are widely accepted as the gold standard for digital accessibility and serve as the basis of most accessibility regulations worldwide.

The Section 508 Standards were established to implement Section 508 of the U.S. Rehabilitation Act, which requires government agencies to provide disabled individuals with access to electronic and information technologies comparable to that available to non-disabled individuals.

reference-global.com aims to conform with level AA of the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.2 and the Section 508 Standards of the U.S. Federal Accessibility Standard. We also align our work with the requirements of the European Accessibility Act (EAA), which has applied to relevant products and services placed on the EU market since 28 June 2025.

Our approach

Accessibility is at the core of our platform development.

We endeavor to ensure that all features and functionality on reference-global.com are developed in line with the WCAG 2.2 guidelines. Both automated and manual testing is conducted to ensure that new features and functionality conform to accessibility standards before being deployed.

We aim to be open and transparent about what is not yet working well on our platform, and we work to resolve known issues as quickly as possible.

A full accessibility audit of reference-global.com is conducted periodically to ensure that the platform conforms to current international accessibility guidelines. Any issues identified are assessed and prioritized in our development roadmap.

Feedback from users is welcomed and helps us improve reference-global.com. Please see the contact options below.

Accessibility Conformance Report

For a detailed review of how reference-global.com supports the WCAG 2.2 and Section 508 criteria, please refer to our Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR), based on VPAT v2.5.

The Report is updated at regular intervals to reflect ongoing improvements to the platform.

Accessibility status of reference-global.com

We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website and our content. You should be able to:

  • Zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
  • Navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • Navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • Listen to most of the website using a screen reader

The website is designed to support:

  • Usage with limited or no vision, or limited perception of color
  • Usage with limited or no hearing, and with no or limited vocal capability
  • Usage with limited reach or mobility

Tested and optimised for browsers: Google Chrome / Microsoft Edge

Evaluation methods used for accessibility testing

  • The website is tested with assistive technologies, including screen readers, screen magnification, contrast switching, keyboard-only navigation, and speech recognition
  • Testing is supported by automated accessibility tools, such as:
    • Axe
    • WAVE
    • Accessibility Insights for Web
    • Lighthouse
    • NVDA
    • VoiceOver (Apple)

Keyboard navigation

The TAB key can be used to navigate through links within the site menu and the main text of each page. Once a link has been highlighted, the ENTER key can be used to activate it.

Headings

Our content pages use structured headings to aid the legibility of the text. The first heading on each page is the main content heading, followed by appropriate sub-headings.

Changing the text size

Most browsers allow you to change the font size; this will be reflected on the site.

Alternative content

For visitors using screen readers or speech browser software, we provide meaningful alternative text for images where this aids understanding of the page content.

Tables

We use tables for the display of tabular data. For users of screen readers and speech browsers, headers are associated with their respective rows and columns to aid legibility.

Magnification and reflow

Text can be resized without assistive technology up to 300 percent without loss of content or functionality.

Copying and printing

All content on reference-global.com is DRM-free. Printing or copying text through browser functionality is possible. Please keep in mind that copyright conditions apply, as detailed in our Terms and Conditions. For information on permitted uses of the content, please contact our Rights Team.

PDF files

To open PDF files, you need a PDF viewer such as Adobe Reader. Adobe provides advice on Adobe Reader’s accessibility features.

Detailed content and access options

reference-global.com is the publishing platform operated by Paradigm Publishing Services (a division of De Gruyter Brill). It hosts journals, books, and conference proceedings from De Gruyter Brill partner publishers across a wide range of disciplines.

Journals

Our journals are available in HTML and PDF format. Some older journal content may be available in PDF format only. All PDFs can be downloaded from the website and viewed in a PDF viewer.

Most tables in HTML articles are compatible with screen readers and other assistive technologies. Some older content may not include alternative text for images.

Because PDF standards have evolved over time, older PDFs may not be fully accessible to screen readers or other assistive technologies.

Books

Our books are offered in PDF (for the content itself) and HTML (for metadata). Book chapters can be downloaded individually as PDFs, and many titles also offer a PDF download for the complete book. Selected titles are additionally available in EPUB format.

EPUB allows content to be enhanced for users with specific accessibility needs (e.g. dyslexia) or preferred reading modalities (e.g. audio, tactile). EPUB also offers features such as resizable fonts, changeable text and background colors, page bookmarking, highlighting, and notes.

As with journals, older PDFs may not meet current accessibility standards.

Conference proceedings

Conference proceedings are available primarily in HTML and PDF. The same accessibility considerations described for journals and books apply to this content type.

European Accessibility Act

In line with De Gruyter Brill’s company-wide commitment, new book titles published from 28 June 2025 onward are produced in accessible formats wherever feasible. These include:

  • PDF/UA-compliant files for the entire book as well as for individual chapters
  • EPUB 3 editions for most titles

These publications include:

  • Alternative texts for figures
  • MathML for formulas (EPUB)
  • Semantic markup of all structural elements (e.g., titles, headings, paragraphs, footnotes)
  • Marked page breaks for reliable citation (EPUB)
  • Accessibility information in the metadata (PDF metadata, EPUB metadata, ONIX)

This means that newly published titles meet the requirements of the European Accessibility Act (EAA) and the standards for accessible documents (ISO 14289-1 / PDF/UA).

Due to the complexity of some individual titles, there may be exceptions where not all accessibility features can be fully implemented. In such cases, we still mark as many elements as possible as accessible, and only resort to publishing a non-accessible title in exceptional cases.

Roadmap

Our ongoing accessibility work focuses on:

  • Continuous improvement of keyboard navigation across search, filter, and product pages
  • Adding further “skip to content” sections for easier navigation through pages
  • Improving error messages for assistive technology in account and form workflows
  • Strengthening color contrast and focus indicators across the platform
  • Extending accessibility features to additional content formats and legacy materials

The platform development team works in continuous-development mode, and any accessibility issues identified will be addressed with high priority.

Contact us

Should you experience any difficulty with accessibility on reference-global.com, please get in touch with our support team. We aim to respond within 3 business days.

If you require an accessible version of a specific piece of content (e.g., a remediated PDF or a figure description), please contact us, and we will do our best to assist.

If you’re not satisfied with our response, you can contact the relevant enforcement body for your region. In the UK, this is the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS). In the EU, complaints can be directed to the national enforcement authority in your country — a list is available from the European Commission.

This statement was last reviewed and updated on April 30, 2026.