Amanda Jefferies

Smartphone Application Usability Evaluation: The Applicability of Traditional Heuristics

The Heuristic Evaluation method has been popular with HCI experts for over 20 years. Yet, we believe that the set of heuristics defined by Nielsen in 1994 needs to be modified prior to the usability evaluation of smartphone applications. In this paper, we investigate the applicability of each of Nielsens traditional heuristics to the usability evaluation of smartphone applications following an analysis of 105 peer-reviewed papers. It is anticipated that this work might benefit HCI practitioners, educators and researchers as they attempt to define usability heuristics for smartphone applications. This set of heuristics, once defined, could enable the discovery of usability issues early in the smartphone application development life cycle, while continuing to be a discount usability engineering method as originally defined by Nielsen.

Mobile Application Usability: Heuristic Evaluation and Evaluation of Heuristics

Many traditional usability evaluation methods do not consider mobile-specific issues. This can result in mobile applications that abound in usability issues. We empirically evaluate three sets of usability heuristics for use with mobile applications, including a set defined by the authors. While the set of heuristics defined by the authors surface more usability issues in a mobile application than other sets of heuristics, improvements to the set can be made.

ENHANCING LEARNING AND TEACHING USING ELECTRONIC VOTING SYSTEMS - THE DEVELOPMENT OF A FRAMEWORK FOR AN INSTITUTIONAL APPROACH FOR THEIR INTRODUCTION

This chapter examines the introduction of Electronic Voting Systems (EVS) at a UK university with the aim of promoting and supporting the student learning experience and moving from an ‘ad hoc’ and individual basis for the use of EVS at the local school level to offering support for using and developing their use on a wider institutional basis. Following discussion of the research into EVS adoption and use, the authors propose a framework to be used by those academics and managers in higher education institutions (HEI) who are interested in introducing specific technologies to support learning, such as the EVS. The framework incorporates a three-way focus on the development of a robust technology infrastructure, the provision of support and training for those using new technologies, placed within the context of sound change management principles and thus supported by the research into these areas. Previous studies in Europe, the United States and Canada into the use of EVS as, for example, in the REAP (Re-Engineering Assessment Practices) project (Nicol & Draper, 2009) have indicated that students are enthusiastic about their use in the lecture hall and seminar room and that the creative use of EVS by academics enhances their use to stimulate and support a number of classroom interactions. To date, however, there has been a lack of research studies on institutional deployment of EVS. This work is intended to outline the salient issues and start that conversation.

Mobile Application Tutorials: Perception of Usefulness from an HCI Expert Perspective

Mobile application tutorials are an opportunity to educate users about a mobile application. Should a mobile application tutorial not be used, the number of frustrated users and uninstalled applications could increase, resulting in a substantial loss in revenue for mobile application developers. Yet, the historical ineffectiveness of printed documentation and online help may have a negative influence on the perception of usefulness of mobile application tutorials for more experienced HCI experts. This in turn may influence their design decisions, whereby they may choose to not design a mobile application tutorial when it may have been better for the user. Our research suggests that while there is a split in the perception of usefulness of mobile application tutorials within the HCI community, the length of time in an HCI role did not have a statistically significant effect on this perception.

Online Proctoring for Remote Examination: A State of Play in Higher Education in the EU

We present some preliminary findings of the Erasmus+ KA2 Strategic Partnership project “Online Proctoring for Remote Examination” (OP4RE). OP4RE aims to develop, implement and disseminate up to par practices for remote examination procedures. More specifically, OP4RE strives to develop guidelines and minimum standards for the secure, legal, fair and trustworthy administration of exams in a remote location away from physical exam rooms in a European context. We present findings and issues regarding security, cheating prevention and deterrence, privacy and data protections as well as practical implementation.

Evaluating the impact of changing contexts on mobile application usability within agile environments

Mobile applications tend to be used in contexts that change over time. These varying contexts may impact the usability, and potentially the overall user experience, of mobile applications. However, the impact of context from a temporal perspective is not fully considered within usability evaluations. Consequently, this work focuses on a conceptual method that attempts to address this limitation. The proposed Contextual Usability Evaluation method promises to allow Human-Computer Interaction experts to evaluate the perceived impact of varying contexts over time on the usability of mobile applications. Despite the focus on context over time, the method is well suited to fast-paced Agile environments.

The Potential Use of the Flexilevel Test in Providing Personalised Mobile E-Assessments

Sixteen students took a test that included a Flexilevel stage and a standard Computer Based Test (CBT) stage. The results were analysed using a Spearman’s Rank Order correlation and showed a significant positive correlation (rs = 0.58, p <=0.05). This was taken to provide support for the notion that it is possible to provide shorter Flexilevel objective tests that are as efficacious as CBTs. Implications that this finding may have for the use of the Flexilevel Test in mobile learning contexts is discussed.

Adapting Heuristics for the Mobile Panorama

Expert-based usability inspection methods are well established; the heuristic method in particular is widely known for being fast, relatively inexpensive and easy to learn. However, traditional heuristics are not easily applied to the mobile panorama. This paper is concerned with preliminary work in the design of a set of heuristics that are tailored to the evaluation of native smartphone applications. In this work, Nielsens original set of heuristics as well as research in the field of usability evaluation for mobile computing were analysed and used to derive a set of heuristics for the evaluation of native smartphone applications.

Heuristic Evaluation for Mobile Applications: Extending a Map of the Literature

Ensuring that mobile applications are as usable as possible is an important area of Human-Computer Interaction research. Part of that research effort is to consider how traditional, tried-and-tested usability evaluation approaches might be applied to newer technologies, including mobile applications. The contribution of this work is to further the work of other researchers by discovering if heuristic evaluation is commonly applied to mobile applications by Human-Computer Interaction practitioners. Additionally, the authors empirically test the suggestion that Nielsen’s heuristics may be generic enough for the usability evaluation of mobile applications.

Mobile Application Usability Heuristics: Decoupling Context-of-Use

Context-of-use is a vital consideration when evaluating the usability of mobile applications. Thus, when defining sets of heuristics for the usability evaluation of mobile applications, a common practice has been to include one or more heuristics that consider context-of-use. Yet, most evaluations are conducted within usability labs. Consequently, the aim of this research is to question the utility of attempting to include inherently complex areas of context-of-use within limited sets of mobile application usability heuristics. To address this, a mapping study uncovered six sets of heuristics that can be applied to mobile application usability evaluations. A within-subjects empirical test with six Human-Computer Interaction practitioners evaluated a well-known travel mobile application using three sets of the mapped heuristics. The study found that the common practice of including context-of-use within mobile application usability heuristics is an ineffective approach.