Mobile Eye Tracking in Usability Testing: Designers Analysing the User-Product Interaction

Today, mobile eye tracking systems have reached a high level of maturity. They are minimal invasive, allow to record a user-product interaction in its real environment and can reliably detect the user s gaze. Hence their implementation in usability testing of physical products promises great potential. This paper investigates whether the application of mobile eye tracking adds value to usability tests conducted by designers. The research question is approached in two steps. First, a laboratory experiment is conducted comparing designer`s analysis of a user-product interaction through videos recorded either from the mobile eye tracking perspective or out of the third-person perspective. Second, different types of mobile eye tracking analyses are applied to usability tests in three case studies. The results of both studies show that compared to the third-person perspective those designers seeing the eye tracking perspective describe a scene significantly more detailed and isolate significantly more causes of problems. Furthermore the application of object-based, sequence-based and visual pattern-based analysis have the potential to uncover relevant users needs.

[1]  M. Hayhoe,et al.  In what ways do eye movements contribute to everyday activities? , 2001, Vision Research.

[2]  Mirko Meboldt,et al.  Skimming and Scrutinizing: Quantifying Two Basic Patterns of Visual Behavior in Design , 2015 .

[3]  Ben J Hicks,et al.  Information operations: a model for characterising information interaction of engineers , 2014 .

[4]  M. Hayhoe,et al.  What controls attention in natural environments? , 2001, Vision Research.

[5]  Peter H. Bloch.  Seeking the Ideal Form: Product Design and Consumer Response , 1995 .

[6]  D. Norman.  The Design of Everyday Things: Revised and Expanded Edition , 2013 .

[7]  Sarah Diefenbach,et al.  INTUI. Exploring the Facets of Intuitive Interaction , 2010, MuC.

[8]  Steven B. Most,et al.  How not to be Seen: The Contribution of Similarity and Selective Ignoring to Sustained Inattentional Blindness , 2001, Psychological science.

[9]  R. Cooper,et al.  What makes a new product a winner: * Success factors at the project level.* , 1987 .

[10]  B. Schneirdeman,et al.  Designing the User Interface: Strategies for Effective Human-Computer Interaction , 1998 .

[11]  Harald Störrle,et al.  TOWARDS DIAGRAM UNDERSTANDING: A PILOT STUDY MEASURING COGNITIVE WORKLOAD THROUGH EYE-TRACKING , 2014 .

[12]  Alan Kennedy,et al.  Book Review: Eye Tracking: A Comprehensive Guide to Methods and Measures , 2016, Quarterly journal of experimental psychology.

[13]  Mirko Meboldt,et al.  Raising Designers' Awareness of User Experience by Mobile Eye Tracking Records , 2014 .

[14]  Aga Bojko,et al.  Eye Tracking the User Experience: A Practical Guide to Research , 2013 .

[15]  Joseph F. Dumas,et al.  A Practical Guide to Usability Testing , 1993 .

[16]  Michael W. Montgomery,et al.  Analysis of a disorder of everyday action , 1995 .

[17]  Kang Chen,et al.  Visual Attention and Eye Movements , 2008 .

[18]  Hartmut Seeger.  Design technischer Produkte, Programme und Systeme , 1992 .

[19]  Michael W. Montgomery,et al.  The quantitative description of action disorganisation after brain damage: a case study , 1991 .

[20]  Mirko Meboldt,et al.  Eye Tracking, a Method for Engineering Design Research on Engineers' Behavior while Analyzing Technical Systems , 2013 .

[21]  Richard Dewhurst,et al.  Using eye-tracking to trace a cognitive process: Gaze behavior during decision making in a natural environment , 2013 .