Research Methods in Human-Computer Interaction

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on the research methods in human–computer interaction. Human performance analysis consists of finding out in what ways and why tasks are hard to accomplish for human users of systems. Classical task analysis can describe at least one way that people can perform a task successfully, and can also point to areas for improvement. More focused methods for analytical research include failure analysis, in which detailed studies are made of what goes wrong when people fail to achieve critical subgoals; (2) individual difference analysis, in which correlations of the difficulty of task components with variations in the measured specific abilities of users pinpoint excessive performance demands; and (3) time profiling, in which task components that demand the most total and most variable time are identified as potential focus for better design. Iterative evaluation, also called formative evaluation, is the most effective method available for ensuring the actual development of a usable system.