Kerem Rızvanoğlu

How to Improve User Experience in Mobile Social Networking: A User-Centered Study with Turkish Mobile Social Network Site Users

This study evaluated the hypothesis that design aspects of the user interface of the applications and the capabilities and constraints of different mobile devices could affect mobile user experience in social network sites (SNS). For this purpose a qualitative mobile usability test, based on a multi-method approach, was carried out with a sample of 25 Turkish university students who were experienced mobile SNS users. The tests were conducted with two different smartphones: Iphone and Blackberry. The participants were observed during the task executions and additional data was collected by the “think aloud” procedure, eye-tracking and video recording of the participants. A short debriefing interview was also made to gain a detailed insight into the user experience. The findings revealed significant mobile usability problems caused specifically by the user interface features of the applications and limitations of each device and enable to propose guidelines to improve user experience in mobile SNS.

The Impact of Human Likeness on the Older Adults’ Perceptions and Preferences of Humanoid Robot Appearance

There’s a growing interest towards human–robot interaction (HRI) as an area of research within human-computer interaction (HCI). Although nowadays robotics studies provide enough knowledge on social robots in major settings, there are still a limited number of studies that investigate expectations, attitudes and behaviors towards humanoid robots in the area of HRI. This study aims to investigate the older adults’ perceptions and preferences of a humanoid robot appearance, which is planned to assist in healthcare activities. The preferences and the perceptions of a sample of 6 older adults are assessed through semi-structured in-depth interviews. By adopting a user-centered design process through the execution of techniques such as persona and user journeys, two different appearances are designed for the assessment: A cartoon-like, simplistic face with no specific gender and a more realistic feminine illustrative face. Findings support the notion that perceptions evoked in the users would depend on the human likeness of the robot’s face. However, gender stereotypes also had impact on the perception and preference of the humanoid faces. A majority of older adults preferred a female human appearance for the robot by referring both to the human likeness and to the task of healthcare. The participants were able to understand the basic facial gestures in both appearances. However, they could not achieve to interpret the intensity of emotions in the expressions. In this context, when compared, simple cartoon-like faces seemed more affective to support detailed understanding of the expressions. Besides, the findings revealed that experience with technology and culture-specific aspects could also affect the perception of robot technology.

Generating guidelines for choosing appropriate metaphors in GUIs through the analysis of cross-cultural understanding of metaphorical icons: an explorative study with French and Turkish users on an e-learning site

This paper investigates the influence of culture on understanding metaphors in GUIs and aims to generate guidelines for choosing appropriate metaphors for users from different cultures. Considering the dual-coded structure of compound metaphorical icons – composed of two major units: image and label – this study evaluates the main hypothesis that understanding of graphical and textual elements of the metaphors differs due to real world and language experiences of the users. A study on a French e-learning site – based on a spatial ‘Campus’ metaphor – was conducted with sixty-eight Turkish and French students. The qualitative study applied a multi-method approach including data collection instruments like background and icon recognition questionnaires and interview. Findings suggest differences in understanding across the two cultural groups and provide an in-depth analysis on the process of cross-cultural understanding of metaphors by focusing on the metaphorical inconsistencies. Through this analysis, guidelines are proposed for choosing metaphors in GUIs.

UX Professionals' Definitions of Usability and UX - A Comparison Between Turkey, Finland, Denmark, France and Malaysia.

This paper examines the views of user experience (UX) professionals on the definitions of usability and UX, and compares the findings between countries and within different socio-cultural groups. A mixed-method analysis was employed on data gathered on 422 professionals through a survey in Turkey, Finland, Denmark, France, and Malaysia. Usability appears to be an established concept, respondents across all countries agreeing on the importance of the ISO 9241-11 definition. There is also a tendency that UX professionals attach organizational perspective to usability. UX professionals diverge when defining UX, and there are systematic differences related to socio-cultural conditions. UX professionals in Finland and France incline more towards the definition highlighting the experiential qualities, when compared to Turkey and Malaysia that incline towards the definition reflecting the ease of use, utility, attractiveness, and degree of usage. Further research should address the implications of the diverse meanings and contexts of usability and UX.

The Use of Neurometric and Biometric Research Methods in Understanding the User Experience During Product Search of First-Time Buyers in E-Commerce

Understanding user experience (UX) during e-commerce has been a relatively important research area especially in the last decade. The use of conventional methods in UX such as task-observation, in-depth interviews and questionnaires has already contributed for the measurement of the efficiency and effectiveness. This empirical study has aimed to make use of both conventional and neuroscientific methods simultaneously to provide a richer analysis framework for understanding the product search experience of the first-time buyers. The current work provides insights for the results from the combined use of conventional and neuroscientific-biometric methods in a UX study. Although this has been an exploratory study within a limited literature, the obtained results indicate a potential use of these methods for UX research, which may contribute to improve the relevant experience in various digital platforms.

Programming a Robotic Toy with a Block Coding Application: A Usability Study with Non-programmer Adults

Recently, sophisticated robotic toys have commercially emerged into our lives. Apart from being only a toy, some of these smart devices are programmable for accomplishing commands given by the end-user. However, usually, end-users are not experts in robotics or programming. In order to explore the usability issues related to the non-programmers’ experience of controlling the robotic toys, we conducted a user study with non-programmers (N = 9) by using Sphero (a robotic toy) and tested its mobile application, called SPRK Lightning Lab for Sphero, which adopted visual programming language with a block-based coding interface. Our procedure consisted of a pre-test and a semi-structured post-test interview as well as an exploring session for the participants and three tasks with a short semi-structured interview at the end of each task. Our findings, which highlighted the usability issues of SPRK Lightning Lab for Sphero application, contribute to the field by providing design suggestions on using a digital medium and a tangible device together, the usability issues of block coding by non-programmers and learnability in a robotic toy application.

Web accessibility in Turkey: awareness, understanding and practices of user experience professionals

Ensuring web accessibility for all is not an easy task and requires the awareness, understanding and practices of people with different roles. User experience professionals (UXPs) play an important role in ensuring web accessibility for all. However, in Turkey, there is no research concerning the status of the awareness, understanding and common practices of UXPs. The overall goal of the present work was to offer an assessment of the current situation in Turkey to suggest areas of improvement and changes to advance web accessibility practices. To meet this goal, we conducted an online survey. The results of this survey show that UXPs believe they have enough training and education in web accessibility; however, they are not familiar with web accessibility standards and assistive technologies used by people with disabilities. They do not work with people with disabilities in their studies on usability, and they do not consider web accessibility in their projects. Our findings also show that UXPs have a top-down approach to web accessibility and they think that it is the responsibility of project managers to make web applications accessible. In brief, the study showed that UXPs in Turkey need to be better educated and trained on web accessibility, and organizations need to realize that both top-down and bottom-up approaches are required to ensure accessibility of the web for all.

Analyzing Playability in Multi-platform Games: A Case Study of the Fruit Ninja Game

Video games offer new perspectives for discussions and studies on user experience, which results in a change of the relevant terms in the context of gaming; replacing ‘usability’ with ‘playability’ and ‘user experience’ (UX) with ‘player experience’ (PX). PX can be inspected in various gaming platforms, which present diverse interaction methods through different peripherals, consequently uncovering the complex nature of video games. Therefore, it is critical to understand the nature of PX through user research. However, limited number of studies investigated PX and playability in detail in order to create an analysis framework for entertainment systems by referring to former UX and usability methodologies. Majority of those studies presented a set of playability heuristics on theoretical basis, which still required to be tested through empirical research in various gaming platforms. In this context, this study focuses on the qualitative analysis of multi-platform PX through a proposed playability heuristics framework derived from relevant literature. This study aims to test the proposed framework in a multi-platform game setting and thus seek ways to contribute to the establishment of a new comprehensive analysis framework to understand multi-platform PX. For this purpose, a qualitative multi-method study based on game platform diversity is designed to measure player experience with 8 users in two different gaming platforms which is based on mobile and full body gesture based interaction. Besides revealing the effect of “On-Screen” elements on PX such as game interface, mechanics and gameplay, the study also presents promising findings for the effect of “Off-Screen” aspects such as the environmental and social factors.

How to Improve the Overall Pre-purchase Experience Through a New Category Structure Based on a Compatible Database: Gittigidiyor (Ebay Turkey) Case

Customer journey mapping is a continuous process that demands end-to-end innovation through qualitative and quantitative user research. It helps to identify key points where service or communication breakdown is most likely and where they are mostly valued. Buyer journey mapping study of Gittigidiyor (Ebay Turkey) revealed the fact that the frequency of the repeat purchase was significantly limited although a high traffic and average visit time were observed. This finding pointed to the need to improve the pre-purchase experience in the web site towards motivating the users to visit more and inspiring them to buy more items. Relying on solid quantitative and qualitative research, this paper presents the action set taken for the realization of this goal. In this context the main action of the process is to renew the category structure through a focus on compatibility, which subsequently enabled the integration of a set of effective improvements. Firstly, this approach led to the improvement of a new listing creation process for the sellers by implementing an innovative and error-free experience. It also enabled to improve the search usability by presenting more relevant results, which was supported with a new smart auto suggestion feature in the search engine box and with smart compatibility filters in search results. The new compatible structure between vertical and horizontal categories brought the implementation of some persuasive features. It provided the increase in count of payment (COP) per item and average selling price (ASP) through cross-selling and up-selling features. Finally, the pre-purchase experience was supported by the integration of product rating/review mechanisms and targeted e-mailing based on previous purchase history of the customers.

The Turkish Central Doctor Rendezvous System Under Spotlight: A User Study with Turkish Senior Users

The Central Doctor Rendezvous System (MHRS), which is one of the platforms within “Health in Transformation Project” to provide efficient health services, is promulgated by Turkish Republic Ministry of Health. The aim of this multi-method qualitative user study is to test the usability of MHRS web site with senior users. The sample includes 10 senior users. The test procedure is based on three steps: The semi-structured pre-test interview, the task observation phase and a debriefing post-test interview. The participants are asked to execute the pre-selected tasks through think-aloud protocol and the audio/mouse tracks are recorded during the navigation. The findings support the notion that the system comprises fatal problems not only for senior users who -due to relevant literature- already fight an uphill battle when interacting with any web environment, but also for a regular citizen who tries to find healthcare support.