Child-home interaction: Design and usability evaluation of a game-based end-user development for children

摘要

Initiative or control authority is an important challenge in smart environments, including smart homes. One of the solutions to this challenge is End-user Development (EUD). The EUD refers to defining customized rules by users to determine their desired behaviour and preferences in the format of trigger-action or event-condition-action for their smart home. But EUD rules need an understanding of mathematical logic; hence they are not understandable for general users including children. This paper proposes a user interface specifically designed for children to define EUD tasks in smart homes. The proposed UI was designed and evaluated in three iterations and had two main characteristics: gamification and 3D abstraction level for showing devices. The proposed UI is evaluated through an experiment by 32 participants aged 8-12 to measure efficiency, operability, perceived usability, enjoyment, and engagement. The experiment results show that game-based design improved usability by increasing efficiency and operability metrics. Also, based on the survey result, it improved enjoyment, engagement, and perceived usability.