Creating User Interfaces

Testing. History.Homework: Look at government sites.

Preview: accessibility

Human testing

• History of problems, which is important to know…

• Tuskegee study– began in good will (most probably)

• though initial purposes may not have been made clear

– went on too long

Institutional Review Board

• Any institution receiving government funding must have an IRB with internal and external members that review and monitor research– human subjects– human tissues– animal subjects

• Criteria are general benefits and individual benefits versus individual costs

• A major part is approval of informed consent forms

Informed consent versus ?

• It is possible to have an IRB approved study that does NOT have informed consent (informed consent ahead of time).

• Studies involving normal teaching and learning can be exempt from full review.

• Privacy / confidentiality considerations.

Milgram Obedience / Authority study

• Subjects told some would be testers and some students.• Testers asked questions and then administered electric

shocks if students failed.• Testers kept asking questions and administering [what

they thought] were more and more painful shocks…• Many more subjects than expected administered the full

shocks.• Varying conditions led to some fall-off, but not much.• Big surprise to Milgram and others.• Studies started in 1961, shortly after start of Eichmann

trial (whose defense was that he was following orders).• Were these studies ethical?

Lessons

• Authority is powerful. Use it wisely, respectfully, and humanely.

• Customer / client / user / student may not always be right, but the program probably could be better.– Teaching programs should not assume

student already knows …

• More?

Hawthorne study

• Studies done at Western Electric in 1920s• Varied factors (e.g., lighting) to see if it

improved production rates.• Found that any change and/or just being

the subject of a study improved rates– workers felt management cared, liked being

the subject of a study, ?

Lessons

• So…studies must allow for the Hawthorne Effect.

• This is one reason why medical studies compare with placebo.

• What is the comparison?

Study of early personal computer operating systems

• Compared people using Apple, Windows and IBM OS (soon discarded) for specific tasks– email– writing a letter– looking up information

• Instrumented: measured how people did• Unreliable subjects: people reported that the

systems were all easy to use even when they had failed at doing the tasks.

Lessons

• User reports have value but need to be considered with other information.– part of usability is user satisfaction.– Can, through use of databases and/or cookies

determine if users return.

• People are different! I wouldn't call something easy to use if I had any trouble. You?

• Other lessons?

Concepts

• Goal is to raise level of discussion

• Generalize

• You all are making progress!

• Reflect more on comparison sites. Apply concepts.

System owner goals versus user goals

• Retail site: goals are aligned. LLBean wants me to buy and I want to buy.

• Facebook: owner wants me to identify myself and my friends so that Facebook can sell ads. I want contact with friends, family, ?

• The New York Times: owner wants to sell ads. Content providers (writers) want to show work. Readers want to be informed.

Concepts, cont.• Efficiency, effectiveness, satisfaction

– Satisfaction also leads to [continued] engagement

• Adapt to novice (new) users versus experienced users without either suffering.– Context based help

• Expectations: older versions, other products, integration with social media.

• Cognitive load: recognition versus recall• User language, knowledge

Testing & Monitoring

• The New York Times has frequent surveys on whether [I] saw certain ads and how I would react.

• Sites can be instrumented– For everyone– For select group.

Privacy

• Definition?

• protection against intrusion into physical or mental space

• protection against use of personal information

• ?

Behavioral marketing

• What about use of information that I didn't value?– likes and dislikes– friends (network)– location– searches– sites visited– ?

• Should websites announce / make sure we know what is being done with our information?

Homework

• Find and compare government sites to discuss next class– For example, NYS versus another site motor vehicle– Obamacare ???

• May not be possible to get far without signing up

– ??

• Preview– Accessibility. Will ask you to find unique source– Following week: user observation study– After that: recap on HTML5 and JavaScript in preparation for

assignment