Tarja Tiainen

The re-production process of gender bias: a case of ICT professors through recruitment in a gender-neutral country

ABSTRACT Women’s under-representation in the fields of science and technology is strong; both in software houses and academic posts. We focus on the academic field by gender sensitive analysis of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) academics. The general picture given by statistics’ meta-analyses illustrates male dominance even in Finland, which is often presented as a country which values gender equality high. For achieving deeper understanding about the process of gender bias reproduction, we focus on one university and its selection of ICT professors. Although every professorship fulfilling is a situated process, they all together shape a homogeneous male-dominant picture. This paper continues on early gender-focused discussion of Studies in Higher Education by presenting an organisational point of view.

Effect of the Immersion Level of a Virtual Loader Simulator on the Sense of Presence

In mobile machine industry, work machine simulators can be used to save time and costs in product development and training. However, investing into expensive or difficult-to-use technology should be avoided if it does not affect measurable user performance or feeling of presence. At Tampere University of Technology, a virtual loader simulator has been constructed in an three-wall walk-in virtual environment. The goal of this research was to investigate how the immersivity of the simulator affects testers’ feeling of presence. A total of 25 test users performed two test runs each with different simulator setups, and the presence level of each user was evaluated by a questionnaire after both runs. The results indicate that switching from 2D view to 3D stereoscopic display did not significantly affect the sense of presence. However, with the motion platform, the test users reported clearly higher presence ratings than without it. In addition, we examined some effects of the users’ backgrounds: Test users who had experience from driving large work machines reported lower presence ratings than those without such experience. The sense of presence for frequent computer players was higher than for non-players, but only in one simulator setup.Copyright

Concerns over students role as test users in virtual environments

It is common to use students as test users in virtual environment studies which focus on the evaluation of virtual products. This paper discusses the usefulness and limits of choosing students as test users. That is done with comparative analysis of three user tests, to which both students and specific group of people participated. We identified two dimensions which determine whether students are acceptable as test users: the need for professional skills and the use of novel technology. If the tasks in the test use need high professional skills, students are ineligible as test users. The description of test users is incomplete in virtual environment studies (e.g. in journals Presence and Virtual Reality). For empirical user-test studies in future, we recommend accurate description of test users, which underlines the quality of test users, not only the quantity.

Innovative tool for specifying customer requirements

This paper presents the design and development of an App based tool for specification of customer requirements (CR) for product development. The most Quality Function Deployment (QFD) tools and methods are system based or used as an Excel document for specification and evaluation. Nowadays tool usage, functionality, and interaction can be designed simple, effective and aesthetically pleasing by means of native apps. They can be opened and accessed directly, much quicker, are rewarding, and enhance the user experience, even offline. Furthermore, the dynamic and playful use of an app will stimulate the interaction, motivation, and communication across various information platforms. We describe and show the initial testing and experiments with the Customer Priorities (CP) App and present preliminary findings and results from our ongoing research. This in turn leads and enables designers and engineers to move closer to the future users, understand their wishes, values and choices between passive and active needs. QFD defines mapping between customer requirements and product characteristics. In practice this means that a customer compares two product characteristics at time and defines which one is more important or if they are equally important. The App was tested in a user experiment. We considered a Smartphone as a design example. We asked test users to compare and specify their preferences for ten given product characteristics. Our test user group consists of 32 participants both from Finland and the Netherlands. They were either graduated students or teaching staff from a university. We show preliminary results and findings from user experiment and testing of the App. Furthermore qualitative results achieved in interview with test users will be presented

User Experience: Consumer Understandings of Virtual Product Prototypes

In this paper, we focus on users’ evaluations of virtual product prototypes designed by furniture companies. Our study is the first step towards design research in the context of physical products. We study virtual prototypes of physical products via the concept of user experience as a subjective issue, not technology-driven as in most user experience studies. To get an idea of users’ subjective experience, we conducted an empirical study using, as our research approach, phenomenography, which allows outlining the differences in users’ technological understandings. In our results, the user experience of virtual product prototypes is understood as a unique combination of various elements, the focus varying from technology to the user’s taste and from a part of a product to a product in its environment.

Framework and Feasibility Study for Pairwise Comparison Tool

In design and engineering context, the use of tools, simulations and multi-realities is already an intrinsic part of design activities, methods and processes. To support participatory design during the ideation phase in a co-creative context, participative tools are needed. User-centered and co-creative design could benefit product creation and innovation process through data-collection (incl. product characteristics and user requirements) from individual data-mining activities. The traditional approach for customer requirements prioritization is pair-wise comparison. It is used both in the QFD method and in the Pugh matrix method. In practice, this means that a user compares two product characteristics at a time and decides which one of the two is more important or if they are equally important. Determining a suitable user interface for the comparison has proven to be the most demanding phase in the implementation of this method. This paper presents alternative ways to implement a customer property tool and discusses experiences with some of its implementations. In the first version, the interface is based on the use of numbers, whereas the last version is more visual, interactive and game-like. The feasibility of the tool was studied in user tests carried out in Finland and in the Netherlands.

Knowledge networks and inter-organisational learning in the context of information industry

Organisations in the information industry are facing constant changes which demand organisational learning. Industry structures are being reformatted, which implies new processes and knowledge bases. Hence, interorganisational competitive advantage also needs cross-organisational learning, learning support systems and management approaches considering quality in this change context. Critical qualities for inter-organisational advantage will be reviewed, likewise the nature of knowledge work for improved quality