THE NOTE-TAKER'S PERSPECTIVE DURING USABILITY TESTING: A HANDS-ON APPROACH TO RECOGNIZING WHAT'S IMPORTANT, WHAT ISN'T

摘要

It is a well-known psychological phenomenon that one's perceptions are influenced by one'sexpectations and biases. This is manifest in behavioral situations ranging from detecting signalsin noise to more complex cognitive situations like recounting eyewitness accounts of observedevents. Such dynamics also affect our thought processes as we observe usability test participants.Yet the approach to observing user behavior, determining what to look for and what to considerimportant, seems highly individualized and not often explicated. Even how-to texts on usabilitytesting give relatively little guidance on the process of observing test participants and taking noteson their performance and comments. Consequently, one suspects that some of the variability inusability test results that has plagued the field may be due to a lack of consensus about how toobserve user behavior or how to prepare for observation.This alternative format presentation will use collective viewing of video clips from sampleusability tests as a stimulant for audience discussion about these issues. We see this as aconsensus building exercise, exploring the extent to which the audience can, as a group, agree onwhat is noteworthy in the clips we present. In doing so we hope to offer some tips and lessonslearned that may point towards defining best practices for observing user behavior and commentsduring usability testing.