Evaluating the User Experience – assignment 5

This time I read about using biometrics in user testing. More specifically about eye tracking, EEG and skin conductance.

I think, that out of these three eye tracking is the most widely used one. Eye tracking generally is tracking, where the user is viewing, but you can also record the users eyes themselves, as squinting or raising eyebrow can also give some insight into what the user is thinking. Tracking where the user is looking can help to identify what are the parts of the screen, that the user is more viewing and where the user is looking to find something (e.g. a button or a text).

EEG is basically measuring users brain activity to determine what the brain is doing – learning, having fun or something else. This approach is probably more effective in situations, where you want to know something about what the user is feeling and how his/her mind is receiving information.

Skin conductance (EDA) is carried out by measuring how electricity is conducted on skin and at the same time measuring the heart rate. This helps to measure empathy of the user.

As conclusion I can say, that for me these methods could be summarized like this: eye tracking – examines, what users do and where do they look for something; EEG – shows what and how makes the user “tick”; skin conductance – shows how the users is feeling on more emotional or social level.

For our Traffic  project I would use eye tracking as the primary method, as it brings out what the user is finding and missing in our app, but I would like to also use EEG, to see if our app makes the user learn something.

Evaluating the User Experience – assignment 4

This time I am comparing Affect Grid, Group-based expert walkthrough and Cognitive Walkthrough.

I find that the Group-based expert walkthrough is a very interesting one and probably gives good feedback for developing a system to replace current solutions. Problem with this is, that you need experts – this would probably work, if you want to create new and better timetable system, than ASIO, but for creating something, that is’t actually currently used (like our traffic app), than it would be difficult to find experts for that. Involving experts makes this an effective method, but also very resource consuming.

Cognitive walkthrough is like a simulation for user testing. You put yourself goals and you think, how to achieve those goals. Than you try to think, that what users can “mess up” and how can they still achieve their goals. I actually have seen similar method in use in computer game production.

Lastly the Affect Grid – this an a good method to put users emotions on paper. You have a matrix, where are two scales (and two other scales at a 45 degree angle) and you mark your current feelings, that the system you are using is making in you.

In our traffic app project I would probably use Cognitive Walkthrough, because it can be done by usability experts and it doesn’t need real users to be conducted. It doesn’t mean, that at a later point real users shouldn’t be tested on, but in early development it seems more time saving.

IFI7159 – M7 individual assignment

Reading the last chapter of HCI Theory was a nice recap of all that was talked about before. Seeing as most of the citations in this books were to papers / books written before the year 2010, makes me wonder how much has HCI Theory evolved since than? 2010 was the year when Apple released the first generation iPad and Microsoft released Kinect.

Based on this book I think, that like with most things in life you shouldn’t be stuck to one thing only. In this case I think, that for using HCI in real life situations one should try different approaches and methods or better yet, combine them. It seems, that maybe a good cycle for developing a new product might be first to map current situation, create theories and test them in the lab, deploy prototype and test it in real life situations fix all the bugs and learn from the experience and repeat for ever. As long as technology and society are evolving I don’t think that any ICT service or device can afford to stop further developing.

My 30 most important concepts in alphabetical order:

1. abilities
2. augmenting
3. body of knowledge
4. cognition
5. contemporary theories
6. culture
7. culture
8. design
9. emotions
10. enjoyment
11. ethnography
12. field research
13. goals
14. hands on
15. HCI
16. holistic experiences
17. human values
18. interaction
19. lifestyle
20. limitations
21. needs
22. perception
23. problem solving
24. real life usage
25. situated action
26. social behavior
27. theoretical
28. time
29. UX
30. wild method

IFI7159 – M6 group assignment

I choose mÕIS as my topic, because it seemed to me, that in developing this only students in Tallinn are use as personas. It is understandable, as only about 2% of whole Tallinn University’s students are actually learning in Haapsalu. Haapsalu College is 100km away from Tallinn and thus there are some differences in how students get their information and what they need. For example instead of ASIO Haapsalu College uses its own timetable system called Start. They also have an in-house solution for teachers and students to exchange materials, called Sahtel. Because I work there, it was also easier for me, to ask students, who learn there.

Context / setting: TLÜ Haapsalu College students

Goal: find out, what Haapsalu’s students wish to see in mÕIS system.

Research problem: On developing mÕIS, only students from Tallinn are questioned and thus the needs of Haapsalu’s student are unknown.

Research questions: What are the most used functions in regular ÕIS?

What information should be accessible through mÕIS?

When would mÕIS be used by students?

Theories: In the wild theory, Activity theory

Methods and techniques for data collection: Structured interview, where interviewer will ask more detailed questions, if something is unclear. While conducting the interview, the person being interviewed was allowed access to ÕIS, in order to help to better remember their experiences. It was pre-requisition for students to be a smartphone user.

Interview structure:

How often do you use ÕIS?

What are the three features / activities  in ÕIS, you use the most?

Would you want this information be also accessible though mÕIS?

When would you use mÕIS?

What additional features would you like to see in mÕIS?

Outcomes:

Two students were interviewed — male (21), studying Applied computer sciences and female (36), studying Handicraft Technology and Design. Both of them brought out, that the thing they do the most in ÕIS is registration to exams (followed by, registration to courses). They both agreed, that registration for exams and reminders about registration and exams themselves would be needed features. Both of them also agreed, that mÕIS should not include most of the features in the full size ÕIS. For example when they register to courses, than they would not do it an a phone. Female student said, that she would like to have her individual assignment also to be presented on the mÕIS and she brought out ekool, as an example. Male student said, that he wouldn’t probably use mÕIS, as he rarely uses regular ÕIS. He added, that he would not care about if it has schedule, because he already has his schedule auto generated as google calendar on his phone.

Conclusion:

Both students were a bit skeptical about the mÕIS and the feature, that they would like to have on mÕIS is ability to register for exams. This could be considered as a pilot study and probably a further study should be involving both Haapsalu’s and Tallinn’s (maybe also Rakvere’s) students, to understand their needs.

IFI7159 – M6 individual assignment

Part two about contemporary theories.

IFI7159 – M5 group assignment

For this task I choose Eesti Energia’s energy saving web service ( https://www.energia.ee/en/nouanded ). Idea behind this web page is to help people to understand how to save energy by modifying their home environment to be energy efficient. For example what light bulbs are more efficient or how to choose home appliances and etc. I think, that everyone has heard, that using better light bulbs can save you money and if you leave the room, than turn the light of, but those ideas are often ignored by people, because all tough they know it, they might not acknowledge it for them selves.

My target audience is basically anybody, that can turn  room lighting on and off by themselves.

I propose, that public toilets should be made to cost some sum of money (e.g. 0.50€ ) and it would be needed to open the door to toilet. This kind of system is already used in some public buildings, but this is only the beginning. After entering the toilet the person probably notices, that the room is dark i.e. the light is turned of and on the wall there is a clearly visible button to turn the light on. Now the person does what ever he wanted to do there and on leaving the toilet he notices a message on the door. The message instructs to turn off the light in order to get back their money, they used to get in the toilet. So if the light is off, than after closing the door money inserted before into the lock system, will be returned. The idea is, that this would help to create a habit for people to switch of the lights on exiting the room.

Similar idea is actually used for making people to return empty bottles —you pay ten cents as a collateral and it will be returned to you once you return those bottles to recycling point.

IFI7159 – M5 individual assignment

This time a first part of a cmap about contemporary theories.

Turn to design

Developing the Drift Table by Andrew Boucher and William Gaver.

This project is about a coffee table, that has a viewing port, where users can see aerial photographs. This one continues photograph and it is moved by placing objects on the table. Table has sensors so it can tell, on which side there is more weight on and scroll the image accordingly. Prototype was done with very high quality and idea behind was, that if this prototype looks like a finished product, people will get more familiar with it and it will be treated as a normal part of furniture instead of treating it as a prototype. This in turn will give better results when analyzing data about the research.

This project turns huge most of its focus on design for both the functionality and the appearance of the product. In designing its appearance a great deal of effort is put in to make it look like it belongs to the living room (not to old fashioned or to sci-fi), materials are picked keeping both the aesthetics and functionality in mind — its surface is glossy white to bring out the viewing port in it. The screen within the device is positioned so its edges are never seen, so it would create an illusion of a real world inside the table. Also its functionality is done with great focus to details —the system can have long runtimes without the need to take care of it. This project is clearly focused on the design part of contemporary theories —aesthetics, lifestyle and play.

Turn to culture

Hatching Scarf: A Critical Design about Anxiety and Persuasive Computing by Youngsuk Lee

In this project a special robotic scarf was created. It moves, opens up and closes depending how much you use it. It is meant to be worn as a scarf, but it’s primary function is actually a pouch, where you can keep snacks. Idea of this project is not to punish or discourage the user from  eating snacks, but rather just changing the meaning of eating snacks.

For me this project is not visually appealing and it seems, that this was not the aim for this project. It rather tries to aim at the social side of eating snacks. Many people do it “just because”. They might be bored of anxious, but often they don’t think about it at a conscious level. This project tries to break into this social side of human interacting with snacks and if not give it a meaning, than at least make the user think about the activity itself. It doesn’t directly encourage of discourage eating snacks, but it points out the activity itself. This project falls into the culture part of contemporary HCI theories —it aims to bring in social aspects.

IFI7159 – M4 group assignment

Part I

Prototyping in Game Design: Externalization and Internalization of Game Ideas 

Jon Manker, Mattias Arvola

Context/ setting:

Prototyping is a well-studied activity in the field of human-computer interaction and interaction design, but its role in computer game design is relatively unexplored. As video games are a huge global market, and prototyping games is something, that every video game company does, than this topic is very relevant.

Research problem:

Professional game designers’ actual prototyping practice has been unaccounted for in empirical studies.

Research questions:

How do game designers work with prototypes and what roles do the prototypes play in the activity of games design?

What were the methods and techniques used for data collection and analysis?

Interviews were conducted using Activity theory as a base. To be more precise, than specifically The Activity Checklist was used. Also analysis using the concepts of internalization and externalization was used.

What were the outcomes?

It turns out, that most game development is based on prototypes and only a small part is actual design (for graphics or audio). Target goals, or visions for the game design, are formulated early in the design process.

Any implications? Conclusions drawn?

The prototypes are viewed as a way to externalize a specific part of the game that is made it conscious to the team and it also helps to coordinate team roles. This can be used as a basis for further research, as it was only the first research of its kind.

Persona Cases: A Technique for Grounding Personas 

Shamal Faily, Ivan Flechais

Context/ setting

Research problem:

There isn’ a clear understating on what kind of personas can or can’t be used on the development of a product.

Research questions:

What happens when a stake-holder challenges a persona?

What were the methods and techniques used for data collection and analysis?

Grounded Theory is that is supported by Computer Aided Qualitative Data Analysis tools. Data  is elicited from interviews or ethnographic research.

What were the outcomes?

For this paper an automatically generated persona (Rick) was created. Later one other personas were generated with even bigger data input to generate them.

Any implications? Conclusions drawn?

They made the case that personas can be independently validated and it is possible to develop personas using Grounded theory.

Exploring the Use of the Human-Artifact Model for Studying Ubiquitous Interactions 

Ilya Shmorgun, David Lamas

Context/ setting:

Research problem:

What are the things to consider if you are creating new digital artifacts alongside existing artifacts (both digital and physical).

Research questions:

What activities are taking place during the lesson?

What artifacts are being used to support these activities?
How are the artifacts being used to support these activities?

What were the methods and techniques used for data collection and analysis?

Ethnographic methods are used, specifically rapid ethnography .

What were the outcomes?

Based on the data collected during the ethnographic study 27 techsonas and 5 personas were produced.

Any implications? Conclusions drawn?

Using ethnographic methods it is possible to understand how new artifacts will work alongside with old artifacts.

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Part II

Scenario 4 – M-Pesa

For this research I would use Activity theory to understand how the system is used currently and how it would be used elsewhere

Context/ setting: M-Pesa is a mobile-phone based money transfer and microfinancing service. Several mobile operators and  financial intermediary around the globe would like to bring M-Pesa to their countries and/or regions. However, M-Pesa was design for a very specific context and we now need to understand the relation of this system with each country and/or region.

Research problem: M-Pesa needs to be able to be deployed to other regions / countries.

Research questions: What features are currently depending on cultural background?

What features should be changed / removed / implemented, to make it usable in other culture spaces?

What were the methods and techniques would use for data collection and analysis?

I would use some method from activity theory and base an interview on it. There should be three sample groups — one that consists of people who use the app, another one, that consists of people who are from same region, but don’t use the app and the third one, that consists of people who are from another regions. At first subjects would be given the app, to test it and get to know it (probably within 30 minutes) and after that an interview would be conducted to understand how this person interprets data in this app.

What are expected the outcomes?

It would be possible to determine if this app could be used in other regions / countries “as is” or it contains some cultural aspects, that should be “delocalized” before starting to introduce the app in other regions / countries.

IFI7159 – M4 individual assignment

This time I had to read about: situated action, ethnography and ethnomethodology, CSCW related theories and frameworks, activity, grounded and hybrid theories. To be honest, that was a lot to comprehend, so I hope I got it right. In addition to that I have to admit, that my cmap doesn’t look so good. It is difficult to find a good layout, because connections are always passing each other. I hope it is still readable for others. (BTW Cmap tool’s auto formatting tool doesn’t work 🙂 )

All modern theories originate from social sciences (although at different levels). This is logical as HCI tries to understand the human behavior when interacting with computers and there are same ground rules, as in sociology. Most of those theories support on some level other theories, so none of those is standing out as radically different.

In my point of view here are the most note worthy ones:
Probably the most insightful is the distributed cognition, but also it’s the most time consuming.
One of the most difficult to use might be the activity theory.
And in my opinion the least helpful is ethnomethodology.

For me there was a question if and how much HCI and CSCW theories and frameworks can be compared. Here were many common points for them, but at the same time they are different things (what was also pointed out.)

IFI7159 – M3 group assignment

This assignment was actually easier, than I first thought, but realizing how easy it is, took some time. Because I did it by myself and sitting behind my computer, than for me the environment or the artefacts weren’t that important, as they were constant.