FreedomScientific
JAWS repeats the radio button and checkbox labels in reading mode
Summary:
During testing with JAWS in reading mode (Virtual PC), it was observed that the screen reader first reads the label and then announces the state of radio button 1. Upon pressing the down-arrow key, the label text for radio button 1 is announced again, as the label text is placed next to the radio buttons. This issue was reported by our screen reader-dependent users who are required to use JAWS in Chrome to complete their tasks. They expressed that the repetitive announcement of radio button/checkbox labels unnecessarily prolongs the time needed to navigate through a large set of radio buttons or checkboxes.
Tools Used: JAWS Version: 2025.2508.120 Browsers: Chrome and Edge OS: Windows 11
Steps to Reproduce:
- Turn on JAWS in Virtual PC mode.
- Navigate to the USWDS Component Example page (we use a similar technique in our web page): https://designsystem.digital.gov/components/radio-buttons/
- Using the keyboard, arrow through the radio group options in the Component Preview section. A similar issue occurs with checkboxes as well: https://designsystem.digital.gov/components/checkbox/
Actual Result:
Jaws users hear the radio button label twice • for the radio button once (Sojourner Truth radio button checked) • for the label text once (Sojourner Truth)
For the given example, JAWS reads
Sojourner Truth radio button checked 1 of 4 Sojourner Truth Frederick Douglass radio button not checked 2 of 4 Frederick Douglass Booker T. Washington radio button not checked 3 of 4 Booker T. Washington George Washington Carver radio button not checked unavailable 4 of 4 George Washington Carver
Expected Result:
JAWS should read the radio button labels only once when they use arrow key for reading. For example,
Sojourner Truth radio button checked 1 of 4 Frederick Douglass radio button not checked 2 of 4 Frederick Douglass Booker T. Washington radio button not checked 3 of 4 George Washington Carver radio button not checked unavailable 4 of 4
I can confirm the JAWS bug. Just to note: the bug does not always occur with radio buttons (e.g., not with https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Reference/Elements/input/radio or https://www.w3.org/WAI/ARIA/apg/patterns/radio/examples/radio/), but only with this specific implementation.
The problem also occurs with the checkboxes under https://designsystem.digital.gov/components/checkbox/, but interestingly, in the "Tile" section, it only occurs with the first checkbox and not with the others. In the “Default” section, it occurs with every checkbox.
The cause is the browser, which in one case transmits the label as a separate element to the Accessibility API (JAWS then outputs the label twice and NVDA outputs the checkboxes without labels and then the label in a further reading step). In the other case, the browser does not transmit the label to the Accessibility API as a separate element at all, but only the checkbox (then NVDA and JAWS only output the checkbox with the label). I have not yet figured out why the browser sometimes decides to transmit the label separately. The differences in the Accessibility API can be easily seen in the Dev Tools (F12).
Related: https://github.com/FreedomScientific/standards-support/issues/305#issuecomment-2099750605
