#34638
Changing the Rules of the Game for the Benefit of the User
In this presentation, Joe Sokohl talks about gathering user research prior to designing and implementing your help deliverables.
Sokohl, Joe. I'd Rather Be Writing (2008). Articles>Documentation>Audience Analysis>User Centered Design
#34711
Part of the problem in our attempt to demonstrate value is that our help deliverables look the same as they did 15 years ago, more or less. Online help and a PDF manual. It’s not a format that engages users. The web marches forward with innovation after innovation, while the technical communicators are figuratively hunched over keyboards, staring at CRT monitors, wearing 1950s horn-rimmed glasses, typing away.
Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2009). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design
#34775
Realistic But Hypothetical Examples
One of the reasons that technical communicators ought to know the business processes of their users (or at least the reasons they’re using the product) is to generate effective examples in the documentation.
Minson, Benjamin. Gryphon Mountain (2009). Articles>Writing>Technical Writing>User Centered Design
#34811
Persuasion design embeds various forms of influence and “choice architectures” in products and services to maximize the likelihood of positive behavior change. The challenge for many product designers is that persuasion design can seem full of tricks that diminish the integrity of the designer. But this approach focuses on direct outcomes, not implicit goals as is so often the case with the UCD approach.
Fabricant, Robert. Design Mind (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>Persuasive Design
#34945
Practitioners of User Centred Design method tend to focus only on immediate user goals and short focused usability. What is meant by long term usability and long term user experience? It needs due attention because only then the impact of products on our environment and health gains prominence! If we take a long term perspective then what we consider usable based on our immediate experience might turn out to be a disastrous product.
Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>User Experience
#34947
Caution: Stereotypes Under Construction
Now that I have your attention, I’ll tell you up front that what Janea follows is not a rant. It’s not even a statement for or against Triplett political correctness. It’s a caution–words of warning about the creation of personas and the practice of user profiling. Even if one calls it the development of an archetype or ideal type, it is still a stereotype.
Triplett, Janea. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Personas
#34948
Sensing of Meaning and Introvert Products
The human mind is geared to derive meaning out of what it perceives. And this attribute is so fundamental to it, that it may even be the most basic building block of human cognition. In our zest to dig out some meaning from everything, we even go to extreme lengths. There have been diviners, oracles, and witch-doctors who try to read meaning from chicken entrails, yarrow sticks, tea leaves, bird flights, etc, with the same seriousness that a doctor reads an x-ray, or a hot-air balloonist reads weather patterns. The famous metaphysical saying “there is no such thing as a coincidence” is something which rides on the underlying philosophy that says - there is always a meaning in everything - if you can find it. Understandably, this philosophy can be a highly devious tool in the hands of occultist quacks, and yet the motive behind it is a fundamental driving force of human cognition.
Sapkal, Pankaj. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>Language>User Centered Design>Cognitive Psychology
#34949
Having worked with personas before the method ever came to be known as personas there are, from my research and practical experience, three important areas that have to be considered: the data material, engagement in the personas descriptions, and buy-in from the organization which is part of the development process whether it is redesign or a development from scratch. This is the rationale behind my development of 10 steps to personas, an attempt to cover the entire process from initial data gathering to ongoing development.
Nielsen, Lene. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Personas
#34953
User Persona: Its Application and The Art of Stereotyping
There is so much discussion about user personas, but very few examples are reported on Internet with some evidence of its actual usage. So here is a persona that I explored long back. It was useful!
Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Personas>Case Studies
#34959
The purpose of this paper is first to highlight some of the social phenomena that are driving the design of people-centred information solutions; second, to develop a broad ontology of information behaviour research that serves to identify factors that should be taken into account when designing such solutions. Finally, the author illustrates how this knowledge is being applied in the design of people-centred inclusive information products and services.
Hepworth, Mark. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design
#34961
What is Enough? Satisficing Information Needs 
This paper seeks to understand how users know when to stop searching for more information when the information space is so saturated that there is no certainty that the relevant information has been identified.
Prabha, Chandra, Lynn SilipigniConnaway, LawrenceOlszewski and Lillie R. Jenkins. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Information Design>Search>User Centered Design
#34962
Affordance Theory: A Framework for Graduate Students' Information Behavior
This study seeks to apply ecological psychology's concept of "affordance" to graduate students' information behavior in the academic library, and to explore the extent to which the affordances experienced by graduate students differed from the affordances librarians were attempting to provide.
Sadler, Elizabeth 'Bess' and Lisa M. Given. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Information Design>User Centered Design
#34963
Information Creation and the Notion of Membership
This article aims to examine a particular sub-set of human information behavior that has been largely overlooked in the library and information science (LIS) literature; how people are socialized to create and use information.
Trace, Ciaran B. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Information Design>User Centered Design
#34964
The purpose of this research is to explore a method for the determination of users' representations of search engines, formed during their interaction with these systems. Determines the extent to which these elicited "mental models" indicate the system aspects of importance to the user and from this their evaluative view of these tools.
Johnson, Frances C. and Sarah E. Crudge. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Web Design>Search>User Centered Design
#34966
Analysis of the Behaviour of the Users of a Package of Electronic Journals in the Field of Chemistry
The purpose of this research is to analyse the behaviour of the users of a package of electronic journals using the data of consumption per IP address. The paper analyses the data of consumption at the University of Barcelona of 31 electronic journals of the American Chemical Society (ACS) in 2003. Data of sessions, articles downloaded and abstracts viewed were analysed.
Borrego, Angel and Cristabal Urbano. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Scientific Communication>User Centered Design
#34991
Design for Effective Support of User Intentions in Information-Rich Interactions
With the rise of Web pages providing interactive support for problem-solving or providing large amounts of information on which a person is expected to act, designers and writers need to consider how a person interacts with increasingly complex information-rich environments and how they intend to use the information. This article examines some of the theory underlying why people make errors early in the problem-solving process when they form an intention. Since these errors are cognitively-based and occur before any physical action, it is harder to analyze their cause or incorporate changes to reduce them in a design. It examines factors which contribute to user errors and which designers and writers must consider to produce documents which reduce user errors in forming intentions.
Albers, Michael J. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>Interaction Design>Cognitive Psychology
#35098
What’s My Persona? Developing a Deep and Dimensioned Character
I believe designers gather data to understand the personas that represent the users for whom they are designing a user interface. This is quite similar to the way actors must develop an understanding of their characters. So, developing their character-building and storytelling skills can help designers—just as it does actors.
Lepore, Traci. UXmatters (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Personas
#35105
Card Sorting: Pushing Users Beyond Terminology Matches
It's easy to bias study participants, whether in user testing or in card sorting, if they focus on matching stimulus words instead of working on the underlying problem.
Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Card Sorting
#35229
Applying Curiosity to Interaction Design: Tell Me Something I Don’t Know
Given just a bit of information, we naturally crave more. Given a puzzle, we have to solve it. So, as interaction designers, how are we using this bit of insight into human behavior?
Anderson, Stephen. Johnny Holland (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>Interaction Design>Cognitive Psychology
#35240
User Stories: A Strategic Design Tool
A collaborative approach enables clients to actively participate in the process, increasing the likelihood of achieving a collective vision for the project. This article focuses on the first step in the journey towards collaboratively developing a User Experience Strategy and is concerned specifically with how user stories are generated, themed and prioritized.
Hagen, Penny and Michelle Gilmore. Johnny Holland (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>User Experience>Personas
#35248
This article describes how the author investigated the business case for the operation of online customer communities, and evaluated their impact. This was achieved through analysis of opinions from members in company-sponsored and member-initiated online customer communities. The research aimed to understand the relationship between customer and company in online communities, explore the motivations of customers to participate in online customer communities, and the benefits of these communities to companies. The main findings of the research revealed that online customer communities are beneficial to both company and customer. The evaluation concludes with a set of recommendations to companies on how online customer communities might be effectively created and managed.
Paterson, Lorraine. Business Information Review (2009). Articles>Business Communication>Social Networking>User Centered Design
#35271
Manipulating Data: Analysis Techniques, Part 3
One of the key characteristics of a manipulation technique versus related techniques like transformation is that the underlying data remains unchanged. The main thing we’re doing is changing the relationship - logical or physical - that one piece of data has with another. Reorganizing the data helps us to identify patterns that may otherwise not be apparent. In fact, it is almost certain that most patterns won’t be visible at first glance. Let’s start by taking a more detailed look at some of the processes that contribute to the manipulation of data.
Baty, Steve. Johnny Holland (2009). Articles>Research>Methods>User Centered Design
#35301
What do the Users Really Want?
I have no idea what our users want. I do know they want information, and I know they want that information to be kept up to date as our product evolves and as far as those basic needs are concerned, I’m happy that we are meeting them. Beyond that I admit I’m not really that sure.
McLean, Gordon. One Man Writes (2009). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design>Surveys
#35354
The Impact of Agile on User-Centered Design
Discusses the impact of an agile software development process on usability testing. Reports opinions about usability testing within a company before and after a change to agile. Presents strategies to incorporate usability testing into agile product development.
Dayton, David and Carol S. Barnum. Technical Communication Online (2009). Articles>User Centered Design>Collaboration>Agile
#35381
We don't really know what attention is, despite all the mumbo-jumbo spouted by Nobel laureates. My guess: most of what people say about attention is hogwash: mere anecdotes, or flimsy cultural norms offered up in a 'be productive, be happy' wrapper. Whenever business thinkers seek to apply an economic metaphor to human cognition, it is a mess: remember "knowledge management"?
Boyd, Stowe. SlideShare (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>User Experience>Emotions
