37,654 research outputs found
Giving a voice to personas in the design of e-government identity processes
Identity processes, such as enrolment and authentication, can have a negative impact on the
user’s experience. By using personas designers get a better understanding of the end-user during
the design process. Personas represent a user archetype to assist in the development of [digital]
products. However this technique involves a measure of subjective interpretation. Following a
qualitative empirical exercise we extend the persona concept to include statistical capabilities in
order to inform the decision making process through measurable and comparable feedback. This
feedback indicates how acceptable an identity mechanism is for a specific group of users. For this
purpose we propose calibrated personas, an extension of the persona design tool that
encapsulates the necessary regression coefficients which can help us predict perceived workload
and users’ willingness to complete a task given specific design decisions.peer-reviewe
Methodological development
Book description: Human-Computer Interaction draws on the fields of computer science, psychology, cognitive science, and organisational and social sciences in order to understand how people use and experience interactive technology. Until now, researchers have been forced to return to the individual subjects to learn about research methods and how to adapt them to the particular challenges of HCI. This is the first book to provide a single resource through which a range of commonly used research methods in HCI are introduced. Chapters are authored by internationally leading HCI researchers who use examples from their own work to illustrate how the methods apply in an HCI context. Each chapter also contains key references to help researchers find out more about each method as it has been used in HCI. Topics covered include experimental design, use of eyetracking, qualitative research methods, cognitive modelling, how to develop new methodologies and writing up your research
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A qualititative approach to HCI research
Whilst science has a strong reliance on quantitative and experimental methods, there are many complex, socially based phenomena in HCI that cannot be easily quantified or experimentally manipulated or, for that matter, ethically researched with experiments. For example, the role of privacy in HCI is not obviously reduced to numbers and it would not be appropriate to limit a person's privacy in the name of research. In addition, technology is rapidly changing – just think of developments in mobile devices, tangible interfaces and so on – making it harder to abstract technology from the context of use if we are to study it effectively. Developments such as mediated social networking and the dispersal of technologies in ubiquitous computing also loosen the connection between technologies and work tasks that were the traditional cornerstone of HCI. Instead, complex interactions between technologies and ways of life are coming to the fore. Consequently, we frequently find that we do not know what the real HCI issues are before we start our research. This makes it hard, if not actually impossible, to define the variables necessary to do quantitative research, (see Chapter 2).
Within HCI, there is also the recognition that the focus on tasks is not enough to design and implement an effective system. There is also a growing need to understand how usability issues are subjectively and collectively experienced and perceived by different user groups (Pace, 2004; Razavim and Iverson, 2006). This means identifying the users' emotional and social drives and perspectives; their motivations, expectations, trust, identity, social norms and so on. It also means relating these concepts to work practices, communities and organisational social structures as well as organisational, economic and political drivers. These issues are increasingly needed in the design, development and implementation of systems to be understood both in isolation and as a part of the whole.
HCI researchers are therefore turning to more qualitative methods in order to deliver the research results that HCI needs.With qualitative research, the emphasis is not on measuring and producing numbers but instead on understanding the qualities of a particular technology and how people use it in their lives, how they think about it and how they feel about it. There are many varied approaches to qualitative research within the social sciences depending on what is being studied, how it can be studied and what the goals of the research are.Within HCI, though, grounded theory has been found to provide good insights that address well the issues raised above (Pace, 2004; Adams, Blandford and Lunt, 2005; Razavim and Iverson, 2006).
The purpose of this chapter is to give an overview of how grounded theory works as a method. Quantitative research methods adopt measuring instruments and experimental manipulations that can be repeated by any researcher (at least in principle) and every effort is made to reduce the influence of the researcher on the researched, which is regarded as a source of bias or error. In contrast, in qualitative research, where the goal is understanding rather than measuring and manipulating, the subjectivity of the researcher is an essential part of the production of an interpretation. The chapter therefore discusses how the influence of the researcher can be ameliorated through the grounded theory methodology whilst also acknowledging the subjective input of the researcher through reflexivity. The chapter also presents a case study of how grounded theory was used in practice to study people's use and understanding of computer passwords and related security
Troubling Vulnerability: Designing with LGBT Young People's Ambivalence Towards Hate Crime Reporting
HCI is increasingly working with ?vulnerable? people yet there is a danger that the label of vulnerability can alienate and stigmatize the people such work aims to support. We report our study investigating the application of interaction design to increase rates of hate crime reporting amongst Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender young people. During design-led workshops participants expressed ambivalence towards reporting. While recognizing their exposure to hate crime they simultaneously rejected ascription as victim as implied in the act of reporting. We used visual communication design to depict the young people?s ambivalent identities and contribute insights on how these fail and succeed to account for the intersectional, fluid and emergent nature of LGBT identities through the design research process. We argue that by producing ambiguous designed texts, alongside conventional qualitative data, we ?trouble? our design research narratives as a tactic to disrupt static and reductive understandings of vulnerability within HCI
Understanding people: A course on qualitative and quantitative HCI research methods
This course will provide an introduction to methods used in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research. An equal focus will be given to both the quantitative and qualitative research traditions used to understand people and interactional contexts. We shall discuss these major research traditions along with their contemporary framings (e.g., in-the-wild research and Interaction Science). By the end of the course attendees will have a detailed understanding of how to select and apply methods to address a range of problems that are of concern to contemporary HCI researchers
Research Methods for HCI: Understanding People Using Interactive Technologies
This course will provide an introduction to methods used in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research. An equal focus will be given to both the quantitative and qualitative research traditions used to understand people and interactional contexts. We shall discuss these major philosophical traditions along with their contemporary framings (e.g., in-the-wild research and Interaction Science). By the end of the course attendees will have a detailed understanding of how to select and apply methods to address a range of problems that are of concern to contemporary HCI researchers
Sensitive Research, Practice, and Design in HCI
New research areas in HCI examine complex and sensitive research areas, such as crisis, life transitions, and mental health. Further, research in complex topics such as harassment and graphic content can leave researchers vulnerable to emotional and physical harm. There is a need to bring researchers together to discuss challenges across sensitive research spaces and environments. We propose a workshop to explore the methodological, ethical, and emotional challenges of sensitive research in HCI. We will actively recruit from diverse research environments (industry, academia, government, etc.) and methods areas (qualitative, quantitative, design practices, etc.) and identify commonalities in and encourage relationship-building between these areas. This one-day workshop will be led by academic and industry researchers with diverse methods, topical, and employment experiences
"Do we need an entire course about it?": Evaluating two years of teaching HCI in computer science
Educators increasingly agree on the importance of teaching Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) to Computer Science (CS) students, but there is debate on how to best integrate HCI into CS curricula. Unfortunately, standard course evaluations typically do not provide sufficient insights for improving HCI classes. In the present article, we used a human-centered design approach to evaluate our HCI classes, building on a qualitative study with CS students from four introductory HCI classes over two years. We report on a qualitative assessment through interviews, photo elicitation and sentence completion. Specifically, we addressed four research questions: which contents were the most relevant, how students experienced the courses, how they view the role of HCI in CS, and which outcomes they perceived from the HCI courses. We gathered rich qualitative insights beyond the standard course evaluations and derived concrete enhancements for future course iterations. We discuss implications for other HCI educators and contribute recommendations for the living HCI curriculum. Furthermore, we reflect on the usefulness of our methodological approach to collect in-depth constructive feedback from students
Between Grassroots and the Hierarchy: Lessons Learned from the Design of a Public Services Directory
There is a growing interest in HCI research studying technology for citizen engagement in civic issues. We are now seeing issues around technologies for empowerment and participation, long discussed in HCI literature, appropriated and formalised in government legislation. In the UK, recent reforms stipulate that community-based service information should be published in continuously updated, collaboratively designed and maintained, online platforms. We report on a qualitative study where we worked with stakeholders involved in the collaborative design, development and implementation of such a platform. Our findings highlight tensions between the grassroots desire to innovate and local governments’ rigid compliance with statutory obligation. We pose a series of challenges and opportunities for HCI researchers engaged in the design of civic technologies to consider going forward, addressing issues of engagement in policy, measures of participation and tools for enabling participatory processes in public institutions
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