Carolyn R. Watters

The evolution of cybergenres

The combination of the computer and the Internet has resulted in the emergence of cybergenre, a new class of genre. Cybergenre can be characterized by the triple , where functionality refers to the capabilities afforded by this new medium. When an existing genre initially migrates to this new medium, it is usually as a faithful reproduction of the existing genre in both content and form with little new functionality. It may then evolve into a variant cybergenre as it incorporates functionality afforded by the computer and Internet. Cybergenres also include novel genres, either not based on previously existing genres or substantially different from existing genres on the basis of increased functionality. These novel genres may have either persistent or virtual instantiations. This paper proposes a taxonomy of these cybergenres and examines the evolution of the news cybergenre and the mathematics dictionary cybergenre within the context of this taxonomy.

Telephone-Based Mental Health Interventions for Child Disruptive Behavior or Anxiety Disorders: Randomized Trials and Overall Analysis

OBJECTIVE Most children with mental health disorders do not receive timely care because of access barriers. These initial trials aimed to determine whether distance interventions provided by nonprofessionals could significantly decrease the proportion of children diagnosed with disruptive behavior or anxiety disorders compared with usual care. METHOD In three practical randomized controlled trials, 243 children (80 with oppositional-defiant, 72 with attention-deficit/hyperactivity, and 91 with anxiety disorders) were stratified by DSM-IV diagnoses and randomized to receive the Strongest Families intervention (treatment) or usual care (control). Assessments were blindly conducted and evaluated at 120, 240, and 365 days after randomization. The intervention consisted of evidence-based participant materials (handbooks and videos) and weekly telephone coach sessions. The main outcome was mental health diagnosis change. RESULTS Intention-to-treat analysis showed that for each diagnosis significant treatment effects were found at 240 and 365 days after randomization. Moreover, in the overall analysis significantly more children were not diagnosed as having disruptive behavior or anxiety disorders in the treatment group than the control group (120 days: χ(2)(1) = 13.05, p < .001, odds ratio 2.58, 95% confidence interval 1.54-4.33; 240 days: χ(2)(1) = 20.46, p < .001, odds ratio 3.44, 95% confidence interval 1.99-5.92; 365 days: χ(2)(1) = 13.94, p < .001, odds ratio 2.75, 95% confidence interval 1.61-4.71). CONCLUSIONS Compared with usual care, telephone-based treatments resulted in significant diagnosis decreases among children with disruptive behavior or anxiety. These interventions hold promise to increase access to mental health services. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION INFORMATION Strongest Families: Pediatric Disruptive Behaviour Disorder, http://www.clinicaltrials.gov, NCT00267579; Strongest Families: Pediatric Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, http://www.clinicaltrials.gov, NCT00267605; and Strongest Families: Pediatric Anxiety, http://www.clinicaltrials.gov, NCT00267566.

A Goal-based Classification of Web Information Tasks

While researchers have been studying user activity on the Web since its inception, there remains a lack of understanding of the high level tasks in which users engage on the Web. We have recently conducted a field study in which participants were asked to annotate all web usage with a task description and categorization. Based on our analysis of participants’ recorded tasks during the field study, as well as previous research, we have developed a goal-based classification of information tasks which describes user activities on the Web.

Effect of task on time spent reading as an implicit measure of interest

Information Filtering systems learn user preferences either through explicit or implicit feedback. However, requiring users to explicitly rate items as part of the interface interaction can place a large burden on the user. Implicit feedback removes the burden of explicit user ratings by transparently monitoring user behavior such as time spent reading, mouse movements and scrolling behavior. Previous research has shown that task may have an impact on the effectiveness of some implicit measures. In this work we report both qualitative and quantitative results of an initial study examining the relationship between user time spent reading and relevance for three web search tasks: relevance judgment, simple question answering and complex question answering. This study indicates that the usefulness of time spent as a measure of user interest is related to task and is more useful for more complex web search tasks. Future directions for this research are presented.

Enabling trust online

Trust is one of the mainstays of commerce. However, as more and more individuals and businesses participate in electronic commerce, it is becoming apparent that much of what supports trust in the traditional commerce setting is unavailable online. This paper explores the nature of trust online, identifying the ten principles underpinning the concept of trust and the online mechanisms that promote it. Label Bureaus that capture authoritative third party ratings and Reputation Systems that capture user feedback and opinions (second party ratings) are examined with respect to these ten principles and it is shown that neither type of rating system satisfies all ten of them. Finally, a new hybrid form of trust infrastructure is proposed that integrates first party information, second party opinions, and third party ratings and, in so doing, addresses all ten of the principles of trust.

Extending the Use of Games in Health Care

Digital games have the ability to engage both children and adults alike. We are exploring the use of games for children with long term treatment regimes, where motivation for compliance is a key factor in the success of the treatment. In this paper, we describe the game framework we are building for this purpose. This framework is meant to support the long term use of a gaming world for children with three main goals: (a) provide easy and continual gaming access on a range of computing appliances including small screen devices; (b) offer games that can be personalized and are adaptable based on the child’s interests or specific illness; and (c) maintain novelty and interest in the treatment over time. This framework not only provides a benefit to the children involved, but also provides user data to the coaches, clinicians, and health researchers involved in the child’s treatment regime.

Using large tables on small display devices

The next evolutionary step in wireless Internet information management is to provide support for tasks, which may be collaborative and may include multiple target devices, from desktop to handheld. This means that the information architecture supports the processes of the task, recognizes group interaction, and lets users migrate seamlessly among internet-compatible devices without losing the thread of the session. If users are free to migrate amongst devices during the course of a session then intelligent transformation of data is required to exploit the screen size and input characteristics of the target appliance with minimal loss of task effectiveness.In this paper we first review general characteristics related to the performance of users on small screens and then examine the navigation of full tables on small screens for users in multidevice scenarios. We examine the methodologies available for access to full tables in environments where the full table cannot be viewed in its entirety. In particular, we examine the situation where users are collaborating across platform and referring to the same table of data. We ask three basic questions: Does screen size affect the performance of table lookup tasks? Does a search function improve performance of table lookup based tasks on reduced screen sizes? Does including context information improve the performance of table lookup based tasks on reduced screen sizes? The answers to these questions are important as individual and intuitive responses are used by the designers of small screen interfaces for use with large tables of data. We report on the results of a user study that examines factors that may affect the use of large tables on small display devices. The use of large tables on small devices in their native state becomes important in at least two circumstances. First, when collaboration involves two or more users sharing a view of data when the individual screen sizes are different. Second, when the exact table structure replication may be critical as a user moves quickly from a larger to a smaller screen or back again mid-task. Performance is measured by both effectiveness, correctness of result, and efficiency, effort to reach a result.

An Examination of Genre Attributes for Web Page Classification

In this paper, we describe a set of experiments to examine the effect of various attributes of web genre on the automatic identification of the genre of web pages. Four different genres are used in the data set, namely, FAQ, News, E-Shopping and Personal Home Pages. The effects of the number of features used to represent the web pages (5, 20, or 100) as well as the types of attributes, <content, form, functionality>, singly and in various combinations are examined. The results indicate that fewer features produce better precision but more features produce better recall, and that attributes in combinations will always perform better than single attributes.

An exploration of web-based monitoring: implications for design

Monitoring occurs when users return to previously viewed web pages to view new or updated information. While tools exist to support web-based monitoring, we know little about the monitoring activities users engage in and the nature of the support needed. We have conducted 40 semi-structured interviews in order to better understand the types of information users monitor and the characteristics of different monitoring activities. Using the data collected during the interviews, we characterized monitoring as an activity within six web information tasks: Browsing, Communications, Fact Finding, Information Gathering, Maintenance, and Transactions. The results of our study have been used to provide general, as well as task specific, recommendations for the design of monitoring tools.

Web Page Transformation When Switching Devices

With network and small screen device improvements, such as wireless abilities, increased memory and CPU speeds, users are no longer limited by location when accessing on-line information. We are interested in studying the effect of users switching from a large screen device, such as a desktop or laptop to use the same web page on a small device, in this case a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant). We discuss three common transformation approaches for display of web pages on the small screen: Direct Migration, Linear and Overview. We introduce a new Overview method, called the Gateway, for use on the small screen that exploits a user’s familiarity of a web page. The users in an initial study prefer using the Gateway and Direct Migration approach for web pages previously used on the large screen, despite the common Linear approach used by many web sites.