Culture in the design of mHealth UI:An effort to increase acceptance among culturally specific groups

Purpose: Designers of mobile applications have long understood the importance of users’ preferences in making the user experience easier, convenient and therefore valuable. The cultural aspects of groups of users are among the key features of users’ design preferences, because each group’s preferences depend on various features that are culturally compatible. The process of integrating culture into the design of a system has always been an important ingredient for effective and interactive human computer interface. This study aims to investigate the design of a mobile health (mHealth) application user interface (UI) based on Arabic culture. It was argued that integrating certain cultural values of specific groups of users into the design of UI would increase their acceptance of the technology. Design/methodology/approach: A total of 135 users responded to an online survey about their acceptance of a culturally designed mHealth. Findings: The findings showed that culturally based language, colours, layout and images had a significant relationship with users’ behavioural intention to use the culturally based mHealth UI. Research limitations/implications: First, the sample and the data collected of this study were restricted to Arab users and Arab culture; therefore, the results cannot be generalized to other cultures and users. Second, the adapted unified theory of acceptance and use of technology model was used in this study instead of the new version, which may expose new perceptions. Third, the cultural aspects of UI design in this study were limited to the images, colours, language and layout. Practical implications: It encourages UI designers to implement the relevant cultural aspects while developing mobile applications. Originality/value: Embedding Arab cultural aspects in designing UI for mobile applications to satisfy Arab users and enhance their acceptance toward using mobile applications, which will reflect positively on their lives.</p

Investigating the appropriateness and relevance of mobile web accessibility guidelines

The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) develop and maintain guidelines for making the web more accessible to people with disabilities. WCAG 2.0 and the MWBP 1.0 are internationally regarded as the industry standard guidelines for web accessibility. Mobile testing sessions conducted by AbilityNet document issues raised by users in a report format, relating issues to guidelines wherever possible. This paper presents the results of a preliminary investigation that examines how effectively and easily these issues can be related by experts to the guidelines provided by WCAG 2.0 and MWBP 1.0. Copyright 2014 ACM

Caring, sharing widgets: a toolkit of sensitive widgets

Although most of us communicate using multiple sensory modalities in our lives, and many of our computers are similarly capable of multi-modal interaction, most human-computer interaction is predominantly in the visual mode. This paper describes a toolkit of widgets that are capable of presenting themselves in multiple modalities, but further are capapble of adapting their presentation to suit the contexts and environments in which they are used. This is of increasing importance as the use of mobile devices becomes ubiquitous

Tactons: structured tactile messages for non-visual information display

Tactile displays are now becoming available in a form that can be easily used in a user interface. This paper describes a new form of tactile output. Tactons, or tactile icons, are structured, abstract messages that can be used to communicate messages non-visually. A range of different parameters can be used for Tacton construction including: frequency, amplitude and duration of a tactile pulse, plus other parameters such as rhythm and location. Tactons have the potential to improve interaction in a range of different areas, particularly where the visual display is overloaded, limited in size or not available, such as interfaces for blind people or in mobile and wearable devices. This paper describes Tactons, the parameters used to construct them and some possible ways to design them. Examples of where Tactons might prove useful in user interfaces are given

Sensing and visualizing spatial relations of mobile devices

Location information can be used to enhance interaction with mobile devices. While many location systems require instrumentation of the environment, we present a system that allows devices to measure their spatial relations in a true peer-to-peer fashion. The system is based on custom sensor hardware implemented as USB dongle, and computes spatial relations in real-time. In extension of this system we propose a set of spatialized widgets for incorporation of spatial relations in the user interface. The use of these widgets is illustrated in a number of applications, showing how spatial relations can be employed to support and streamline interaction with mobile devices

DOLPHIN: the design and initial evaluation of multimodal focus and context

In this paper we describe a new focus and context visualisation technique called multimodal focus and context. This technique uses a hybrid visual and spatialised audio display space to overcome the limited visual displays of mobile devices. We demonstrate this technique by applying it to maps of theme parks. We present the results of an experiment comparing multimodal focus and context to a purely visual display technique. The results showed that neither system was significantly better than the other. We believe that this is due to issues involving the perception of multiple structured audio sources

Beyond representations: towards an action-centric perspective on tangible interaction

In the light of theoretical as well as concrete technical development, we discuss a conceptual shift from an information-centric to an action-centric perspective on tangible interactive technology. We explicitly emphasise the qualities of shareable use, and the importance of designing tangibles that allow for meaningful manipulation and control of the digital material. This involves a broadened focus from studying properties of the interface, to instead aim for qualities of the activity of using a system, a general tendency towards designing for social and sharable use settings and an increased openness towards multiple and subjective interpretations. An effect of this is that tangibles are not designed as representations of data, but as resources for action. We discuss four ways that tangible artefacts work as resources for action: (1) for physical manipulation; (2) for referential, social and contextually oriented action; (3) for perception and sensory experience; (4) for digitally mediated action

Social positioning: Designing the Seams between Social, Physical and Digital Space

Mobile settings are not only physically and digitally mediated; they are also inhabited by people - a social space. We argue that careful design exposing the connections, gaps, overlays and mismatches within and between physical, digital and social space allow for a better understanding and thereby mastering of the resulting combined space. Two concepts are explored in MobiTip, a social mobile service for exchanging opinions among peers: intramedia seams concerning network coverage and position technology, and intermedia seams between digitally transmitted tips and the physical, social context surrounding the user. We introduce social positioning as an alternative and complement to the current strive for seamless connectedness and exact positioning in physical space

Making a financial time machine:a multitouch application to enable interactive 3-D visualization of distant savings goals

Financial planning and decision making for the general public continues to vex and perplex in equal measure. Whilst the tools presented by a typical desktop computer should make the task easier, the recent financial crisis confirms the increasing difficulty that people have in calculating the benefits of deferring consumption for future gains (i.e. Saving). We present an interactive concept demonstration for Microsoft SurfaceTM that tackles two of the key barriers to saving decision making. Firstly we show an interface that avoid the laborious writing down or inputting of data and instead embodies the cognitive decision of allocation of resources in a physical gesture based interface, where the scale of the investment or expenditure correlates with the scale of the gesture. Second we show how a fast-forward based animation can demonstrate the impact of small increments in savings to a long term savings goal in a strategy game-based, interactive format. The platform uses custom software (XNATM format) as opposed to the more usual WPFTM format found on Surface applications. This enables dynamic 3-D graphical icons to be used to maximize the interactive appeal of the interface. Demonstration and test trial feedback indicates that this platform can be adapted to suit the narrative of individual purchasing decisions to inform educate diverse user groups about the long term consequences of small financial decisions