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Smestad, Doran. "Towards Understanding Systems Through User Interactions." Digital WPI, 2015. https://digitalcommons.wpi.edu/etd-theses/593.
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Modern computer systems are complex. Even in the best of conditions, it can be difficult to understand the behavior of the system and identify why certain actions are occurring. Existing systems attempt to provide insight by reviewing the effects of actions on the system and estimating their cause. As computer systems are strongly driven by actions of the user, we propose an approach to identify processes which have interacted with the user and provide data to which system behaviors were caused by the user. We implement three sensors within the graphical user interface capable of extracting the necessary information to identify these processes. We show our instrumentation is effective in characterizing applications with an on-screen presence, and provide data towards the determination of user intentions. We prove that our method for obtaining the information from the user interface can be done in an efficient manner with minimal overheads.
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Bowerman, Julian. "Understanding users in context : an investigation into designers' requirements." Thesis, Loughborough University, 2014. https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/2134/14327.
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In the future, as world markets become more diverse, designers will be increasingly asked to create products for people dissimilar to themselves. Human issues, such as product pleasure, will also become more important as advances in manufacturing (enabling companies to produce high quality goods more cheaply) will mean companies will look elsewhere to achieve a competitive edge. These changes will affect designers who presently work with little or no user information. This thesis investigates the attributes designers need in resources that offer them an immediate yet broad understanding of users. The research presented in the thesis has a philosophical strand and a design strand. In the design strand, two mock up resources and a prototype resource are developed. These creations are used in the philosophical strand: the mock ups are used to provide focus while collecting opinions from participants and the prototype is evaluated at the end of the research as if it were a real resource. The thesis starts with a literature review; this review reveals that designers need to understand users' physical, psychological and social needs as well as their environments if they are to design appropriate products for them. It explains that designers find much ergonomics information too technical and not visual enough and reveals that no tools or methods exist that offer a broad and instant understanding of users at the start of the design process. Following this, the results from a set of interviews and a focus group are presented. These studies reveal that designers want both personal and general user information that is reliable, video based, contextual and authentic. The results also show that designers want a fast, online resource that allows information to be easily tagged, compared and shared. Next, the thesis describes the development of the prototype resource and its examination using a heuristic inspection. This resource is then evaluated by designers. The evaluation reveals that designers perceived that the resource would be of value to the design process and thought that the videos showing people going about their everyday lives and the virtual tours around people's homes would be particularly useful. The thesis concludes that designers want contextual user information presented as easily navigable video in an Internet based resource. In doing so, it provides an original contribution to knowledge.
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Goecks, Jeremy. "Understanding the social navigation user experience." Diss., Atlanta, Ga. : Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/1853/29750.
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Thesis (Ph.D)--Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2010.Committee Chair: Mynatt, Elizabeth D.; Committee Member: Edwards, W. Keith; Committee Member: Grinter, Rebecca E.; Committee Member: McDonald, David W.; Committee Member: Potts, Colin. Part of the SMARTech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Collection.
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Wallace, Rick L., Nakia J. Woodward, and Rachel R. Walden. "Understanding User Needs Through Focus Groups." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2016. https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu-works/8704.
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Kaviani, Maryamsadat, and Farahani Esmaeil Farmahini. "Understanding user acceptance of Digital Library." Thesis, Internationella Handelshögskolan, Högskolan i Jönköping, IHH, Informatik, 2011. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:hj:diva-16806.
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The use of Digital library has grown considerably past two decades. Using new tech-nology effectively depends on acceptance for that technology, which in turn would be affected by users’ perception of that technology’s usefulness and ease of use. Research on "usable" digital library shows that potential users of digital libraries may not use it, in spite of the system availability and the millions of dollars that have been spent. There is a need to identify external factors which has an affect users’ intention of using this system.
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Whyte, Grafton A. "Understanding user perceptions of successful information systems." Thesis, Cranfield University, 1994. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.260374.
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Amezcua, Hidalgo Ramon Andres. "Towards Understanding the “User of the Future”." Thesis, KTH, Integrerad produktutveckling, 2019. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-261212.
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A fast-moving technological landscape is driving companies of today to constantly search for the solutions of tomorrow. As a result, companies are constantly searching for the next big thing and speculating on possible futures. Across multiple industries, it is easy to find concepts, workshops, hackathons, and marketing campaigns that address the concept of the future. With themes titled as "The future of ..."(be it medicine, food, manufacturing, sports, etc.) or "... of the future" (be it cars interiors, homes, transportation, nutrition, etc.), companies try to reimagine products and services for a speculative future. Design practice plays a large role in this movement. However, a specific contemporary global phenomenon, the Aging Populations, is surfacing important limitations to user-centred design. These limitations are resulting in unsustainable practices and negative connotations in design solutions that lead to Ageism. Furthermore, user-centred design processes are faced with the challenge of creating proposals that are limited by what could be misconceptions and prejudices based on personal knowledge. Since these proposals are conceived by present factors, needs and users, design is hence fringed by temporal positioning. The combination of these factors can lead to ideas of the future that may not be adequate or accurate for both an uncertain future, and the people that might participate in it. One may ask then, when identifying new opportunities, or when designing new products, what characteristics should be considered in the product development process that will remain stable and continuous in the future? This thesis explores this challenge. Resulting in a theoretically developed framework that helps design practitioners to understand the context that people may interact with in the future. Based on a Practice-Oriented Design approach, this thesis proposes a Transgenerational Practice Distillation Process that results in a Transgenerational Practice Unit, which aims at understanding the context in which the “Users of the Future” will interact with products and services. Then, by studying the practice of eating in a Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) in Tokyo with people with ages 60 to 80, the proposed framework explores how long-lasting contextual elements can be found through participatory design techniques. The output of the proposed framework consisted of stimulating material for creative processes that helped product innovation professionals in reimagining the way restaurants can be designed.Den snabba teknikutvecklingen driver dagens företag att ständigt söka efter morgondagens lösningar. Som ett resultat av detta söker företag ständigt efter nästa stora möjlighet och spekulerar i möjliga framtider. Inom flera branscher är det lätt att hitta koncept, workshops, hackathons och marknadsföringskampanjer som behandlar framtidens koncept. Med teman med titeln "Framtiden för ..." (vare sig det är medicin, mat, tillverkning, sport etc.) eller "... av framtiden" (vare sig det är bilar, interiörer, hem, transport, näring osv.), försöker företag ombilda produkter och tjänster för en spekulativ framtid. Designpraktik spelar en stor roll i denna utveckling. Men ett specifikt samtidigt globalt fenomen, åldrande population, lyfter upp viktiga begränsningar för användarcentrerad design. Dessa begränsningar resulterar i ohållbar praktik och negativa konnotationer i designlösningar som i sin tur leder till ålderism. Dessutom står användarcentrerade designprocesser inför utmaningen att skapa förslag som är begränsade av vad som kan vara missuppfattningar och fördomar baserade på personlig kunskap. Eftersom dessa förslag är påhittade utifrån nuvarande faktorer, behov och användare, är designen därför kantad av en temporär positionering. Kombinationen av dessa faktorer kan leda till framtidsidéer som kanske inte är tillräckliga eller korrekta varken för en osäker framtid eller de människor som kan delta i den. Man kan då fråga sig, när man identifierar nya möjligheter, eller när man utformar nya produkter, vilka egenskaper bör beaktas i produktutvecklingsprocessen som kommer att förbli stabila och kontinuerliga i framtiden? Detta examensarbete undersöker denna utmaning. Resultatet är ett teoretiskt utvecklat ramverk som hjälper designutövare att förstå det sammanhang som människor kan interagera med i framtiden. Baserat på en praktikorienterad designmetod föreslås en Destillationsprocess för transgenerationspraktiker och som resulterar i en enhet av transgenerationspraktiker, som syftar till att förstå sammanhanget där "framtidens användare" kommer att interagera med produkter och tjänster. Genom att studera äldre människors (60-80 år) praktik att äta på restaurang i Tokyo, undersöker det föreslagna ramverket hur långvariga kontextuella element kan hittas genom deltagande designmetoder. Resultatet från det föreslagna ramverket består av material för att stimulera kreativa processer och som kan stödja utvecklare att omformulera hur restauranger kan utformas.
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Nagarajan, Bala Meenakshi. "Understanding User-Generated Content on Social Media." Wright State University / OhioLINK, 2010. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=wright1284152205.
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Berglund, Marie. "Voice User Interface for Understanding Wireless Sensor Technology." Thesis, Linköpings universitet, Institutionen för teknik och naturvetenskap, 2006. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-97127.
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The research area of wireless sensor network (WSN) witnessed an increased attention in the last few´years due to the great potential to allow a comprehensive monitoring of the environment. With the sensing technology of WSN large areas can be monitored allowing for a comprehensive study of the environment. Handling WSN requires prior knowledge about the technology and this becomes an issue for a first time user, unable to explore the whole potential of the networks. Incorporating WSN technology with voice recognition technology allows the creation of a platform for developing new innovative user interactions. This report presents a novel voice user interface for understanding wireless networks by integrating the voice recognition features of the Center for Spoken Language Understanding (CSLU) toolkit with wireless sensor nodes allowing a first time user to interact with a wireless sensor network through voice input.The voice user interface software allows a new user to collect data from the network through voice input enabled by conversing with an animated agent. The software is highly extensible and its envisioned future deployment will be to teach Irish secondary school students more about wireless technology.
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Kelley, Patrick Gage. "Designing Privacy Notices| Supporting User Understanding and Control." Thesis, Carnegie Mellon University, 2013. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=3573455.
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Users are increasingly expected to manage complex privacy settings in their normal online interactions. From shopping to social networks, users make decisions about sharing their personal information with corporations and contacts, frequently with little assistance. Current solutions require consumers to read long documents or go out of their way to manage complex settings buried deep in management interfaces, all of which lead to little or no actual control.
The goal of this work is to help people cope with the shifting privacy landscape. While our work looks at many aspects of how users make decisions regarding their privacy, this dissertation focuses on two specific areas: the current state of web privacy policies and mobile phone application permissions. We explored consumers' current understandings of privacy in these domains, and then used that knowledge to iteratively design and test more comprehensible information displays.
These prototyped information displays should not be seen as final commercially-ready solutions, but as examples of privacy notices that can help users think about, cope with, and make decisions regarding their data privacy. We conclude with a series of design suggestions motivated by our findings.
Keywords: privacy, notice, usability, user interfaces, security, mobile, policy, P3P, HCI, information design.
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Hinton, C. Matthew. "Technology assimilation : understanding the user - IT professional relationship." Thesis, Cranfield University, 1994. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.282177.
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Dow, Steven P. "Understanding user engagement in immersive and interactive stories." Diss., Atlanta, Ga. : Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/1853/26468.
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Thesis (Ph.D)--Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009.Committee Chair: MacIntyre, Blair; Committee Member: Bolter, Jay; Committee Member: Guzdial, Mark; Committee Member: Mateas, Michael; Committee Member: Mynatt, Elizabeth. Part of the SMARTech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Collection.
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Chalbi, Amira. "Understanding and designing animations in the user interfaces." Thesis, Lille 1, 2018. http://www.theses.fr/2018LIL1I089.
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Malgré leur omniprésence croissante dans les interfaces graphiques modernes, les animations sont encore sous-appréhendées. Bien que la recherche et la pratique fournissent des directives utiles, nous n'avons pas encore une idée claire sur ce qui définit une animation efficace pour les interfaces.La discorde sur la valeur de l'animation est principalement due au fait que la plupart des études précédentes ont étudié l'avantage d'ajouter une animation particulière à une interface particulière, laissant un manque notable dans la compréhension des nombreux aspects qui influencent la performance de l'animation. Ces études ont aussi évalué la valeur de l'animation à travers un angle empirique étroit,ce qui fait que plusieurs facettes de l'animation restent non dévoilées.Cette thèse contribue un premier pas vers une compréhension plus profonde du vaste espace de conception de l'animation, et vers une meilleure assimilation des différents mérites de l'animation. Nous fournissons d'abord une vue structurée sur les rôles et les inconvénients de l'animation dans les interfaces graphiques.Nous présentons ensuite les fondements théoriques de l’animation pour la visualisation d'information.Nous discutons les principaux défis pour la conception et l'évaluation de l'animation dans les visualisations dynamiques. Nous étudions la signification de la Loi du Destin Commun, appliquée aux trajectoires d'animation, dans les visualisations dynamiques. Nous introduisons ensuite un espace de conception qui permet une caractérisation holistique de l'animation séquentielle, et proposons un outil de création pour permettre le prototypage et l'exploration du ''staging'' dans les visualisationsDespite their increasing popularity and omnipresence in modern graphical interfaces, animations are still largely under-comprehended. While prior research and practice provide useful insights about the merits and downsides of animation, it is still unclear what makes a good and effective animation that improves the usability and expressivity of graphical interfaces. The disparity of opinions about the value of animation is mainly due to the fact that most of previous studies have investigated the benefit of adding a particular animation to a particular interface, leaving a notable gap in the deep understanding of the many design aspects that influence the performance of animation. Prior research have also predominantly assessed the value of animation through a narrow empirical angle, which had left several facets of animation unveiled.This thesis contributes a first constructive step toward better understanding the vast design space of animation and mapping out the various merits of animation that can enrich user interfaces from different perspectives. We first provide a structured view of the roles and drawbacks of animation in user interfaces. We then present the theoretical fundamentals for animation in information visualization. We discuss the main challenges for designing and evaluating animation in dynamic visualizations. Through an empirical study, we investigate the meaning of the Common Fate Law, applied on animation trajectories, in dynamic visualizations. We then introduce a design space that allows a holistic characterization of staged animation and propose an authoring tool to support the prototyping and exploration of staging in visualizations
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Revell, Kirsten Magrethe Anita. "Mental models : understanding domestic energy systems and user behaviour." Thesis, University of Southampton, 2015. https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/386139/.
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Energy consumption due to domestic heating is a major contributor to climate change. Kempton (1986) proposed that ‘Mental Models’ of thermostat controls could be linked to energy wasting behaviour. Mental models can be thought of as ‘pictures in the mind’ that help users understand and operate systems. This thesis explored if changes to the heating interface design could influence the mental model held, to promote appropriate behaviour with heating controls. Consideration of bias is essential when undertaking research into mental models. The ‘Tree-Rings’ framework was developed to address this, resulting in the creation of the ‘Quick Association Check’ (QuACK); a method for capturing and analysing mental models and behaviour related to heating controls. QuACk was initially applied to a case study of 6 householders. This revealed a ‘systems level’ approach was necessary to understand behaviour strategies, in contrast to Kempton’s single device focus. Differences in mental models explained differences in self-reported behaviour. Misunderstandings of how heating controls worked together and the influence of thermodynamics on boiler activation, explained variations in consumption between households. Norman’s (1983) ‘7 stages of activity’ was used to produce a design specification for a ‘control panel’ style heating interface. This focused on correcting key misunderstandings in householders’ mental models, that hindered appropriate behaviour. A home heating simulation was developed to allow the design to be compared with a typical presentation of heating controls. The new interface significantly improved the appropriateness of users’ mental models at the system and device levels. More appropriate behaviour was found with specific controls and the duration of goal achievement was significantly increased. These findings have implications for strategies to reduce domestic consumption through behaviour change, and provide insights that can be used to improve the design of home heating interfaces.
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Hooper, Clare J. "Towards designing more effective systems by understanding user experiences." Thesis, University of Southampton, 2010. https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/194995/.
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This thesis is about social technologies, user experiences and the problems of creative design. It is motivated by a desire to give people who are offline the access to social technologies that is currently provided via the web. There exist technologically- oriented approaches to solving this problem, but their focus on technology comes at a cost of neglecting the experiential aspects which motivate the work. This focus can result in systems which are functional but unappealing to (or even unusable by) their target audiences. After describing the motivation for the work, this thesis explains the state of the art and presents an exemplar system built with a technological focus. This thesis then presents Teasing Apart, Piecing Together (TAPT), a Software Engineering design process developed to address this gap in the field of software design. TAPT enables the understanding of user experiences and scaffolds the redesign of these for new contexts. After explaining the TAPT process and how it was built, a three-phase mixed methods evaluation is described. This consists of a large-scale comparative evaluation, an expert review of the outputs of that evaluation and case studies grounded in industrial and academic practice. The results of these evaluations show that TAPT, which can be used in an agile manner, provides a strong analytical framework for understanding experiences and supports the redesign of experiences in new contexts.
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Chen, Long. "Understanding and exploiting user intent in community question answering." Thesis, Birkbeck (University of London), 2014. http://bbktheses.da.ulcc.ac.uk/77/.
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A number of Community Question Answering (CQA) services have emerged and proliferated in the last decade. Typical examples include Yahoo! Answers, WikiAnswers, and also domain-specific forums like StackOverflow. These services help users obtain information from a community - a user can post his or her questions which may then be answered by other users. Such a paradigm of information seeking is particularly appealing when the question cannot be answered directly by Web search engines due to the unavailability of relevant online content. However, question submitted to a CQA service are often colloquial and ambiguous. An accurate understanding of the intent behind a question is important for satisfying the user's information need more effectively and efficiently. In this thesis, we analyse the intent of each question in CQA by classifying it into five dimensions, namely: subjectivity, locality, navigationality, procedurality, and causality. By making use of advanced machine learning techniques, such as Co-Training and PU-Learning, we are able to attain consistent and significant classification improvements over the state-of-the-art in this area. In addition to the textual features, a variety of metadata features (such as the category where the question was posted to) are used to model a user's intent, which in turn help the CQA service to perform better in finding similar questions, identifying relevant answers, and recommending the most relevant answerers. We validate the usefulness of user intent in two different CQA tasks. Our first application is question retrieval, where we present a hybrid approach which blends several language modelling techniques, namely, the classic (query-likelihood) language model, the state-of-the-art translation-based language model, and our proposed intent-based language model. Our second application is answer validation, where we present a two-stage model which first ranks similar questions by using our proposed hybrid approach, and then validates whether the answer of the top candidate can be served as an answer to a new question by leveraging sentiment analysis, query quality assessment, and search lists validation.
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French, David James. "Understanding and Addressing Collaboration Challenges for the Effective Use of Multi-User CAD." BYU ScholarsArchive, 2016. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/etd/6229.
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Multi-user computer-aided design (CAD) is an emerging technology that promises to facilitate collaboration, enhance product quality, and reduce product development lead times by allowing multiple engineers to work on the same design at the same time. The BYU site of the NSF Center for e-Design has developed advanced multi-user CAD prototypes that have demonstrated the feasibility and value of this technology. Despite the possibilities that this software opens up for enhanced collaboration, there are now a new variety of challenges and opportunities to understand and address. For multi-user CAD to be used effectively in a modern engineering environment, it is necessary to understand and address both human and technical collaboration challenges. The purpose of this dissertation is to understand and address these challenges. Two studies were performed to better understand the human side of engineering collaboration: (1) engineers from multiple companies were interviewed to assess the collaboration challenges they experience, and (2) players of the multi-player game Minecraft were surveyed and studied to understand how a multi-user environment affects design collaboration. Methods were also developed to address two important technical challenges in multi-user CAD: (1) a method for detecting undo conflicts, and (2) additional methods for administering data access. This research addresses some of the important human and technical collaboration challenges in multi-user CAD. It enhances our understanding of collaboration challenges in engineering industry and how multi-user CAD will help address some of those challenges. It also enhances our understanding of how a multi-user design environment will affect design collaboration. The method developed for detecting conflicts that occur during local undo in multi-user CAD can be used to block conflicts from occurring and provide the user with some information about the cause of the conflict so they can collaborate to resolve it. The methods developed for administering data access in multi-user CAD will help protect against unauthorized access to sensitive data.
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McLay, Graeme David. "Understanding the role of information in the passenger rail industry." Thesis, University of Southampton, 2000. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.342751.
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Fida, Mah-Rukh. "Understanding mobile network quality and infrastructure with user-side measurements." Thesis, University of Edinburgh, 2019. http://hdl.handle.net/1842/33238.
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Measurement collection is a primary step towards analyzing and optimizing performance of a telecommunication service. With an Mobile Broadband (MBB) network, the measurement process has not only to track the network's Quality of Service (QoS) features but also to asses a user's perspective about its service performance. The later requirement leads to "user-side measurements" which assist in discovery of performance issues that makes a user of a service unsatisfied and finally switch to another network. User-side measurements also serve as first-hand survey of the problem domain. In this thesis, we exhibit the potential in the measurements collected at network edge by considering two well-known approaches namely crowdsourced and distributed testbed-based measurements. Primary focus is on exploiting crowdsourced measurements while dealing with the challenges associated with it. These challenges consist of differences in sampling densities at different parts of the region, skewed and non-uniform measurement layouts, inaccuracy in sampling locations, differences in RSS readings due to device-diversity and other non-ideal measurement sampling characteristics. In presence of heterogeneous characteristics of the user-side measurements we propose how to accurately detect mobile coverage holes, to devise sample selection process so to generate a reliable radio map with reduced sample cost, and to identify cellular infrastructure at places where the information is not public. Finally, the thesis unveils potential of a distributed measurement test-bed in retrieving performance features from domains including user's context, service content and network features, and understanding impact from these features upon the MBB service at the application layer. By taking web-browsing as a case study, it further presents an objective web-browsing Quality of Experience (QoE) model.
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Saeedi, Ardavan. "Latent variable models for understanding user behavior in software applications." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/115779.
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Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2018.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 147-157).
Understanding user behavior in software applications is of significant interest to software developers and companies. By having a better understanding of the user needs and usage patterns, the developers can design a more efficient workflow, add new features, or even automate the user's workflow. In this thesis, I propose novel latent variable models to understand, predict and eventually automate the user interaction with a software application. I start by analyzing users' clicks using time series models; I introduce models and inference algorithms for time series segmentation which are scalable to large-scale user datasets. Next, using a conditional variational autoencoder and some related models, I introduce a framework for automating the user interaction with a software application. I focus on photo enhancement applications, but this framework can be applied to any domain where segmentation, prediction and personalization is valuable. Finally, by combining sequential Monte Carlo and variational inference, I propose a new inference scheme which has better convergence properties than other reasonable baselines.
by Ardavan Saeedi.
Ph. D.
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Wallace, Rick L., Nakia J. Woodward, and Emily C. Weyant. "Re-Thinking our Understanding of User Needs Through Focus Groups." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2016. https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu-works/8701.
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Rwechungura, Assumpta D. "Understanding the impact of user fees on gender in Tanzania." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2003. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/9444.
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Bibliography: leaves 104-115.In 1993 the government of Tanzania introduced user fees in health care services. The poor, children under five, Maternal and Child Health/Family Planning and maternity services are among the groups exempted from fees. However, it is observed that the fee exemption system in public health facilites is not functioning. According to the media and gender activists, the introduction of user fees in primary health care services was reported to have impacted negatively on vulnerable groups, particularly poor women. This study aims at exploring how user fees for health care impacted on poor Tanzanian women. In order to have a clear understanding of the issues, the study establishes the impact of user fees on poor women as perceived by poor women in urban and rural areas, and by key stakeholders involved in user fee policy development. Further, the study looks at efforts made by diferent stakeholders to take into account a gender perspective in the design and implementation of the policy. Finally, the study examines whether the policy process took into consideration the potential negative effects on poor women after its implementation.
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Li, Shuguang. "Beyond question answering : understanding the information need of the user." Thesis, University of York, 2011. http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/4171/.
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Intelligent interaction between humans and computers has been a dream of artificial intelligence since the beginning of digital era and one of the original motivations behind the creation of artificial intelligence. A key step towards the achievement of such an ambitious goal is to enable the Question Answering systems understand the information need of the user. In this thesis, we attempt to enable the QA system's ability to understand the user's information need by three approaches. First, an clarification question generation method is proposed to help the user clarify the information need and bridge information need gap between QA system and the user. Next, a translation based model is obtained from the large archives of Community Question Answering data, to model the information need behind a question and boost the performance of question recommendation. Finally, a fine-grained classification framework is proposed to enable the systems to recommend answered questions based on information need satisfaction.
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Liu, Haiming. "A framework for understanding user interaction with content-based image retrieval : model, interface and users." Thesis, Open University, 2010. http://oro.open.ac.uk/23806/.
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User interaction is essential to the communication between users and content-based image retrieval (CBIR) systems. User interaction covers three key elements: an interaction model, an interactive interface and users. The three key elements combine to enable effective interaction to happen. Many studies have investigated different aspects of user interaction. However, there is lack of research in combining all three elements in an integrated manner, especially through well-principled data analysis based on a systematic user study. In this thesis, we investigate the combination of all three elements for interactive CBIR. We first propose uInteract - a framework including a novel four-factor user interaction model (FFUIM) and an interactive interface. The FFUIM aims to improve interaction and search accuracy of the relevance feedback mechanism for CBIR. The interface delivers the FFUIM visually, aiming to support users in grasping how the interaction model functions and how best to manipulate it. The framework is tested in three task-based and user-oriented comparative evaluations, which involves 12 comparative systems, 12 real life scenario tasks and 50 subjects. The quantitative data analysis shows encouraging observations on ease of use and usefulness of the proposed framework, and also reveals a large variance of the results depending on different user types. Accordingly, based on Information Foraging Theory, we further propose a user classification model along three user interaction dimensions: information goals (I), search strategies (S) and evaluation thresholds (E) of users. To our best knowledge, this is the first principled user classification model in CBIR. The model is operated and verified by a systematic qualitative data analysis based on multi linear regression on the real user interaction data from comparative user evaluations. From final quantitative and qualitative data analysis based on the ISE model, we have established what different types of users like about the framework and their preferences for interactive CBIR systems. Our findings offer useful guidelines for interactive search system design, evaluation and analysis.
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Adler, W. Alexander III. "Testing and Understanding Screwdriver Bit Wear." Thesis, Virginia Tech, 1998. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/36701.
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This thesis is focused on gaining a better knowledge of how to design and test Phillips screwdriver bits. Wear is the primary concern in applications where the bit is used in a power driver. Such applications include drywalling, decking and other construction and home projects.
To pursue an optimal design, designers must have an understanding how the bit geometry changes with wear. To make use of the geometrical data, the designer must also have an understanding of the fundamentals of the bit/screw surface contact and its effect on force distribution.
This thesis focuses on three areas. First, understanding how the tool and bit are used, and what factors contribute to bit wear. With this understanding, a test rig has been designed to emulate typical users and, in doing so, produce the factors that cause wear. Second, there must be a means to analyze geometric changes in the bit as it wears. A method for doing this was developed and demonstrated for a Phillips bit, but the process can be applied to other bits. Finally, the fundamentals of surface contact must be understood in order to apply the geometrical information obtained to improved bit design.Master of Science
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Han, Shengnan. "Understanding user adoption of mobile technology : focusing on physicians in Finland /." Åbo : Akademi university, 2005. http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb401424769.
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Song, Ji‐Won. "Understanding user interaction problems with wireless connection via research through design." Thesis, Brunel University, 2015. http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/10890.
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People frequently have problems making multiple devices work together. In this thesis, I use the Research‐through‐Design approach to understand the issues and propose solutions. Through an iterative series of investigations, the problems people have with the connection of multiple devices has been examined, including usability issues, difficulties with the sequential connection procedure, and difficulties performing an action. I found non‐expert users to have difficulties with interpreting and evaluating the devices’ interaction status regarding the sequence of the connection procedure. When an evaluation problem occurs, they have problems dealing with the required sequence or diagnosing the error in their interactions. The problem understanding was examined from additional cases. The comprehension of the problems allowed me to generate design implications and propose a design solution. I proposed two implications with which to solve the stated problem. I suggested helping users evaluate device interaction and reduce unnecessary user interactions. A design framework was suggested as a solution by providing diagrammatic representations of system interaction and signals revealing device status. I then assessed the suggested solutions using paper prototypes, and demonstrated their effectiveness. The improved interfaces helped users evaluate device connection status so they may determine how to proceed with sequential interaction. With the Research‐through‐Design approach constructing knowledge by integrating theories and hypothesis, I found the feature of user‐multiple device interaction in which a user is required to manage the interaction between the devices. A single device cannot aid the user interaction. In the dissertation, I proposed a desirable state of user interaction, which is achieved by two devices revealing connection states together so that a user can earn a useful system image.
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Kang, Youn Ah. "Informing design of visual analytics systems for intelligence analysis: understanding users, user tasks, and tool usage." Diss., Georgia Institute of Technology, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/1853/44847.
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Visual analytics, defined as "the science of analytical reasoning facilitated by interactive visual interfaces," emerged several years ago as a new research field. While it has seen rapid growth for its first five years of existence, the main focus of visual analytics research has been on developing new techniques and systems rather than identifying how people conduct analysis and how visual analytics tools can help the process and the product of sensemaking. The intelligence analysis community in particular has not been fully examined in visual analytics research even though intelligence analysts are one of the major target users for which visual analytics systems are built. The lack of understanding about how analysts work and how they can benefit from visual analytics systems has created a gap between tools being developed and real world practices.
This dissertation is motivated by the observation that existing models of sensemaking/intelligence analysis do not adequately characterize the analysis process and that many visual analytics tools do not truly meet user needs and are not being used effectively by intelligence analysts. I argue that visual analytics research needs to adopt successful HCI practices to better support user tasks and add utility to current work practices. As the first step, my research aims (1) to understand work processes and practices of intelligence analysts and (2) to evaluate a visual analytics system in order to identify where and how visual analytics tools can assist. By characterizing the analysis process and identifying leverage points for future visual analytics tools through empirical studies, I suggest a set of design guidelines and implications that can be used for both designing and evaluating future visual analytics systems.
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Evers, Vanessa. "Cultural aspects of user interface understanding : an empirical evaluation of an e-learning website by international user groups." Thesis, Open University, 2001. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.392867.
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Gibson, Lorna A. "Understanding the user experience of Ehealth and the implications of Social Computing." Thesis, University of Dundee, 2010. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.527606.
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Gad, Darin. "Information design of public documents : applying Gestalt principles to improve user understanding." Master's thesis, Université Laval, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11794/31723.
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La conception des documents publics joue un rôle important dans la manière dont l'utilisateur perçoit et comprend les informations importantes qu'ils véhiculent. De plus, la conception de tels documents peut avoir un impact important sur l’utilisateur en ce qui concernesa confiance et son processus décisionnel. Les principes de design d’informationpeuvent apporter de précieuses perspectives sur comment les documents publics devraient être conçus pour qu’ils réalisent leurs objectifs. Cependant, le domaine du design d’informationdes documents publics souffre d’un manque important dans l’application de ces principes. D'autre part, les principes perceptuels delaGestalt peuvent expliquer comment les humains organisent des éléments visuels en groupes et comment ils reconnaissent des patrons. Depuis leur introduction au début du XXesiècle, les principes delaGestalt ont servi à améliorer le processus visuo-perceptuel dans différents champs d'application (telles que la peinture, la sculpture, la création graphique et le design d’information). Dans ce mémoire, nous étudionsl’application des principes de la Gestalt pour améliorer la compréhension de l’utilisateur des documents publics. Pour ce faire, en premier lieu, une méthode d’évaluation heuristique est adaptée pour identifier les problèmes d'utilisabilité dans les documents publics. Deuxièmement, une méthode d’analyse de documents, reposant sur des mesures des éléments visuels dans les documents, est proposée pour étudier l’application des principes de Gestalt, ainsi que les principes de conception graphique, dans les documents publics. Un échantillon de deux documents publics est utilisé pour démontrer et tester la méthodologie proposée. Sur la base des failles de conception identifiées par les deux méthodes susmentionnées, une approche minimale est proposée pour appliquer les principes de la Gestalt pour résoudre les problèmes identifiés. Les résultats obtenus montrent que l’application des principes de la Gestalt peut améliorer l'accessibilité et la compréhensibilité de l'information présentéedans les documents publics.The design of public documents playsan important role in user perception and understanding of the important information they contain. Moreover, the design of such documents can have an important impact on user self-confidence and decision making. The information design principles pertainingto how to visually structure and verbally construct documents to be easily well perceived and understood can provide valuable insights on how public documents should be designed and presented. Yet, in designing public documents there is a lack in applyingthe information design methods and frameworks. On the other hand, the Gestalt principles of perception can explain how humans organize visual elements into groups and how humans perceive and recognize patterns. Since their introduction in the early twentieth century, the Gestalt principles were examined and studied various times to improve the visual perceptual process in many application areas such as: painting, sculpture, graphic design and information design. Accordingly, this work studies the application of the Gestalt principles to improve the user understanding of public documents. To this end, first an adapted heuristic evaluation method is proposed to identify the usability problems of public documents. Secondly, based on precise measurements of thevisual elements within the documents, a document analytics method is proposed to examine the application of the Gestalt principles as well as the design principles in public documents. A sample comprising two public documents is used to test and demonstrate the proposed methodology. Based on the design flaws detected by the aforementioned two methods, a minimal approach is adopted to apply the Gestalt principles to solve the identified problems. The results obtained show that the integration of the Gestaltprinciples in the design process can improve the accessibility of information in public documents and resolve many of the usability problems in these documents.
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Flannery, Orla. "Childhood obesity : understanding the user perspective to inform prevention and treatment strategies." Thesis, University of Salford, 2009. http://usir.salford.ac.uk/26679/.
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As a result of increasing prevalence in childhood obesity, it is now at the forefront of policy agendas. To date, however, there is a paucity of evidence in the UK, relating to the behavioural and environmental factors which influence diet and physical activity from the user perspective. Using the social-ecological framework, the principle aim of this thesis was to obtain the user perspective to identify priorities for action to inform prevention and treatment strategies for childhood obesity. A series of qualitative studies were carried out to determine the views of professionals, parents and children. In addition, a family based intervention for childhood obesity was evaluated. There was congruence in the findings across all studies. Poor diet and physical inactivity were identified as the main causes of obesity. Cost, availability, a lack of knowledge on portion sizes and food labels, a lack of appropriate facilities for activity and an unsupportive environment emerged as the main barriers. Across the studies, parents were consistently purported to be a contributor and a potential solution to childhood obesity. In terms of interventions, cookery courses which provide parents with practical information were deemed crucial. In addition, the development of a training programme for health care professionals on childhood obesity was identified as a priority. Children identified the use of the media and the internet as mechanisms with which to engage with children. With regard to the family based intervention, there was a significant decrease (p<0.05) in BMI and a significant increase in self-esteem (/?<0.05) post intervention. Although it is likely that the intervention had an effect, these findings warrant further investigation. In summary, this thesis provides a comprehensive insight to childhood obesity from the user perspective. Whilst change needs to occur to reduce the wider environmental barriers, equally parents are responsible for childhood obesity. However, there needs to be a concerted effort from health care professionals to ensure that parents have the necessary skills and knowledge to change behaviour.
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Chambers, Benjamin Daniel. "Understanding the Selection and Use of Water Related Innovations in Green Buildings." Thesis, Virginia Tech, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/25298.
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This manuscript provides an understanding of water conservation related innovations in green buildings, both in terms of what is being selected in design phase and how professionals perceive their experiences with these innovations. The innovations examined include toilets, showers, sinks, plumbing, water heating, appliances, alternative water sources, landscaping, performance monitoring, and user education. It contains a literature review of unanticipated consequences associated with these innovations, and creates a framework for categorizing these based on a synthesis of the literature of unanticipated consequences. A review of certification documents from the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system identifies what landscaping, toilet, and shower innovations are most commonly designed for in LEED certified buildings. These data are also used to identify differences in innovation selection across climate regimes. An internet survey of green building professionals provides a picture of satisfaction with these innovations in practice. It also gives examples of these experiences so that future users can take advantage or take caution as necessary.Master of Science
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McLaughlin, Logan M. "Understanding Road Use and Road User Interaction: An Exploratory Ethnographic Study Toward the Design of Autonomous Vehicles." Thesis, University of North Texas, 2016. https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc849632/.
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This thesis contributes to research that informs the design of autonomous vehicles (AVs). It examines interactions among various types of road users, such as pedestrians and drivers, and describes how findings can contribute to the design of AVs. The work was undertaken as part of a research internship at Nissan Research Center-Silicon Valley on the Human Understanding in Design team. Methods included video ethnography “travel-alongs” which captured the experience of travel from the point of view of drivers and pedestrians, analysis of interaction patterns taken from video of intersections, and analysis of road laws. Findings address the implications of what it will mean for AVs to exist as social entities in a world of varied road contexts, and how AVs might navigate the social act of driving on roads they share with a variety of human users. This thesis contributes to an emerging body of research and application on the subject of the AV in the world.
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Li, Liuqing. "Event-related Collections Understanding and Services." Diss., Virginia Tech, 2020. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/97365.
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Event-related collections, including both tweets and webpages, have valuable information, and are worth exploring in interdisciplinary research and education. Unfortunately, such data is noisy, so this variety of information has not been adequately exploited. Further, for better understanding, more knowledge hidden behind events needs to be unearthed. Regarding these collections, different societies may have different requirements in particular scenarios. Some may need relatively clean datasets for data exploration and data mining. Social researchers require preprocessing of information, so they can conduct analyses. General societies are interested in the overall descriptions of events. However, few systems, tools, or methods exist to support the flexible use of event-related collections.
In this research, we propose a new, integrated system to process and analyze event-related collections at different levels (i.e., data, information, and knowledge). It also provides various services and covers the most important stages in a system pipeline, including collection development, curation, analysis, integration, and visualization. Firstly, we propose a query likelihood model with pre-query design and post-query expansion to rank a webpage corpus by query generation probability, and retrieve relevant webpages from event-related tweet collections. We further preserve webpage data into WARC files and enrich original tweets with webpages in JSON format. As an application of data management, we conduct an empirical study of the embedded URLs in tweets based on collection development and data curation techniques. Secondly, we develop TwiRole, an integrated model for 3-way user classification on Twitter, which detects brand-related, female-related, and male-related tweeters through multiple features with both machine learning (i.e., random forest classifier) and deep learning (i.e., an 18-layer ResNet) techniques. As guidance to user-centered social research at the information level, we combine TwiRole with a pre-trained recurrent neural network-based emotion detection model, and carry out tweeting pattern analyses on disaster-related collections. Finally, we propose a tweet-guided multi-document summarization (TMDS) model, which generates summaries of the event-related collections by using tweets associated with those events. The TMDS model also considers three aspects of named entities (i.e., importance, relatedness, and diversity) as well as topics, to score sentences in webpages, and then rank selected relevant sentences in proper order for summarization.
The entire system is realized using many technologies, such as collection development, natural language processing, machine learning, and deep learning. For each part, comprehensive evaluations are carried out, that confirm the effectiveness and accuracy of our proposed approaches. Regarding broader impact, the outcomes proposed in our study can be easily adopted or extended for further event analyses and service development.Doctor of Philosophy
Event-related collections, including both tweets and webpages, have valuable information. They are worth exploring in interdisciplinary research and education. Unfortunately, such data is noisy. Many tweets and webpages are not relevant to the events. This leads to difficulties during data analysis of the datasets, as well as explanation of the results. Further, for better understanding, more knowledge hidden behind events needs to be unearthed. Regarding these collections, different groups of people may have different requirements. Some may need relatively clean datasets for data exploration. Some require preprocessing of information, so they can conduct analyses, e.g., based on tweeter type or content topic. General societies are interested in the overall descriptions of events. However, few systems, tools, or methods exist to support the flexible use of event-related collections. Accordingly, we describe our new framework and integrated system to process and analyze event-related collections. It provides varied services and covers the most important stages in a system pipeline. It has sub-systems to clean, manage, analyze, integrate, and visualize event-related collections. It takes an event-related tweet collection as input and generates an event-related webpage corpus by leveraging Wikipedia and the URLs embedded in tweets. It also combines and enriches original tweets with webpages. As an application of data management, we conduct an empirical study of tweets and their embedded URLs. We developed TwiRole for 3-way user classification on Twitter. It detects brand-related, female-related, and male-related tweeters through their profiles, tweets, and images. To aid user-centered social research, we combine TwiRole with an existing emotion detection tool, and carry out tweeting pattern analyses on disaster-related collections. Finally, we propose a tweet-guided multi-document summarization (TMDS) model and service, which generates summaries of the event-related collections by using tweets associated with those events. It extracts important sentences across different topics from webpages, and organizes them in proper order. The entire system is realized using many technologies, such as collection development, natural language processing, machine learning, and deep learning. For each part, comprehensive evaluations help confirm the effectiveness and accuracy of our proposed approaches. Regarding broader impact, our methods and system can be easily adopted or extended for further event analyses and service development.
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Karpefors, Max. "The bubble funnel : A visualisation concept designed to increase understanding of user funnels." Thesis, Uppsala universitet, Avdelningen för visuell information och interaktion, 2019. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-386594.
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To understand user acquisition is of major importance for digital service providers. Drawing on a case study at Hedvig AB, this thesis presents how a user funnel can be visualised in, to my knowledge, a novel way to increase the understanding of the inflow of users. The design is human-centred and research methods include, among others, semi-structured interviews and evaluation sessions. The visualisation is developed for the web with JavaScript and D3. In contrast to previous solutions, this visualisation takes advantage of motion and combines the state of the art representation of a user funnel with a bubble chart. This approach is a step away from the static visualisation and a step towards a more engaging and interactive solution to communicate and analyse data. Two main ideas of usage are presented: one for simulation of historical data and one for live data. Mainly, this visualisation provides a clear overview of a whole user funnel, it addresses user cohorts in different ways and it efficiently shows where users drop-off.
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Yemm, Heather. "Cognitive impairment in later life : understanding lay, professional and memory service user perspectives." Thesis, University of Worcester, 2017. http://eprints.worc.ac.uk/5942/.
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This thesis explores what a range of people know and understand about cognitive impairment. The research presented here also explores the language and terminology that people use when discussing cognitive impairment. In order to do so, a mixed methods design was employed, involving three related studies; a systematic review of the literature about knowledge and understanding of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), a questionnaire study exploring respondents’ knowledge and understanding of cognitive impairment, and an interview study building on the results of the questionnaire and exploring perceptions of cognitive impairment in-depth. The systematic review included 30 studies; 20 qualitative articles and 10 survey studies. The questionnaire study received 417 responses predominantly from England, but including some international responses. Questionnaire respondents were drawn from six population groups: people living with cognitive impairment, care partners, younger adults, older adults, healthcare professionals, and dementia specialists. Twenty-one semi-structured interviews were conducted with representatives from each of these six participant groups. The findings from these studies suggest that most participants were able to offer a definition of cognitive impairment, highlighting similar symptoms (focusing on memory problems) and causes (such as brain damage and ageing). Participants discussed cognitive impairment in the context of dementia and were uncertain as to whether the two were synonymous or different. Where participants felt that cognitive impairment and dementia were different, they were unable to articulate these differences suggesting that the boundaries between cognitive impairment and dementia are not clear to the wider population. Participants offered causation accounts and narratives which suggested both controllable and uncontrollable factors may play a role in cognitive health, but participants generally claimed that cognitive impairment was beyond an individual’s personal sphere of control. Participants identified that professionals and the lay population used different language and labels when discussing cognitive impairment and most felt that MCI was not an acceptable or appropriate label. The use of the word memory in diagnostic services for cognitive impairment and dementia (such as memory clinic, memory assessment service) is challenged as this may contribute to the perception that cognitive impairment and dementia are conditions which are solely or primarily characterised by a memory impairment. The results of the studies inform the development of an illness representation model of cognitive impairment, providing a framework on which to base future information resources, media messages and public health and awareness campaigns. This thesis has begun to address a key gap in the literature, considering the views of a range of populations about cognitive impairment. However, future research is needed to explore factors which influence perspectives about cognitive impairment and to consider whether these perspectives change over time and can be influenced by educational campaigns and information.
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Dasgupta, Deb Prasad 1980. "Facilitating user understanding of optimizations : a case study of channel route network planning." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2003. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/16962.
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Thesis (M.Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2003.Includes bibliographical references (p. 145-146) and index.
This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.
As more complex and important tasks become automated, the human-system interface is becoming more prominent. It is necessary for users to trust the systems performing these tasks; otherwise, they are unlikely to use the system. Automated planning is one such task. An integral part of planning systems using an Operations Research approach is the use of optimization techniques to create plans. In problems of realistic size, the solution process of the optimization is too complex to follow in detail, so it is not possible for the user to evaluate the effectiveness of the solution. For instance, the Channel Route Network Planning System uses an optimization to create plans for the shipment of cargo between military bases around the world. Although it chooses the optimal plan for a given set of inputs, its users could plan more effectively if they better understood the underlying decision space of its optimization and had ready access to the details of the plans it generates. This thesis presents ChRIS, the Channel Route Information System. ChRIS is designed to enable users to gain insight into plans developed by results of the Channel Route Network Planning System. It helps users understand the internal structure of the individual plans and illustrates the differences between multiple plans, thereby helping users to understand the optimization, which we believe will engender trust in the system's choice of optimal plans.
by Deb Prasad Dasgupta.
M.Eng.
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Karlsson, Stefan. "A Norm Creative Perspective : Understanding users through norm creative theories." Thesis, Umeå universitet, Institutionen för informatik, 2018. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-154776.
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There is a saying that we should not attempt to fix what is not broken, but we cannot afford to stick tothat mindset if we want to be able to design products and services that matter to the user. We shouldbroaden our views, explore new things and see what we can learn from them and use that knowledge toexpand on our existing methods. In recent years there have been a lot of work regarding how normsinfluence us to act and feel in certain ways, what if the knowledge behind norms could be utilized withindesign? To answer this question a study was conducted where two so called norm creative methodswere tested in a series of focus groups to see what potential the methods held in regard to improvingexisting methods or serve as basis for the creation new methods within user research.
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Rossa, Michael. "System images : user's understanding and system structure in the design of information tools." Thesis, Royal College of Art, 1990. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.602326.
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Alexander, Jason. "Understanding and Improving Navigation Within Electronic Documents." Thesis, University of Canterbury. Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10092/3438.
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Electronic documents form an integral part of the modern computer age---virtually all personal computers have the ability to create, store and display
their content. A connection to the Internet provides users with an almost endless source of documents, be they web-pages, word-processor files or emails.
However, the entire contents of an electronic document are often too large
to be usefully presented on a user’s screen, at a single point in time. This issue is usually overcome by placing the content inside a scrolling environment. The view onto the document is then modified by directly adjusting a scrollbar or by employing tools such as the mousewheel or paging keys. Applications may also provide methods for adjusting the document’s zoom and page layout.
The scrollbar has seen widespread adoption, becoming the default tool used to visualise large information spaces. Despite its extensive deployment, researchers have little knowledge on how this and related navigation tools are used in an everyday
work environment. A characterisation of users’ actions would allow designers
to identify common behaviours and areas of inefficiency as they strive to improve navigation techniques.
To fill this knowledge gap, this thesis aims to understand and improve navigation within desktop-based electronic documents. This goal is achieved using a five step process. First, the literature is used to explore document navigation tasks
and the tools currently available to support electronic document navigation. Second, a software tool called AppMonitor, that logs users’ navigation actions, was developed. Third, AppMonitor was deployed in a longitudinal study to characterise
document navigation actions in Microsoft Word and Adobe Reader. Forth,
to compliment this study, two task-centric observations of electronic document navigation were performed, to probe the reasons for navigation tool selection. Finally, the Footprints Scrollbar was developed to improve one common aspect of navigation—within-document revisitation.
To begin, two areas of current knowledge in this domain are overviewed:
paper and electronic document navigation and electronic document navigation tools. The literature review produced five categories of document navigation tasks: ‘overviewing and browsing’, ‘reading’, ‘annotating and writing’, ‘searching’ and ‘revisitation’. In a similar fashion, electronic document navigation tools
were reviewed and divided into eight categories: core navigation tools (those
commonly found in today’s navigation systems), input devices, scrollbar augmentations, content-aware navigation aids, visualisations that provide multiple document views, indirect manipulation techniques, zooming tools and revisitation tools.
The literature lacked evidence of an understanding of how these current document navigation tools are used. To aid the gathering of empirical data on tool use, the AppMonitor tool was developed. It records user actions in unmodified Windows applications—specifically for this research, Microsoft Word and Adobe Reader. It logs low-level interactions such as “left mouse button pressed” and
“Ctrl-f pressed” as well as high level ‘logical’ actions such as menu selections and scrollbar manipulations. It requires no user input to perform these tasks, allowing study participants to continue with their everyday work.
To collect data to form a characterisation of document navigation actions, 14 participants installed AppMonitor on their computer for 120 days. This study found that users primarily employ the mousewheel, scrollbar thumb and paging keys for navigation. Further, many advanced navigation tools that are lauded for
their efficiency, including bookmarks and search tools, are rarely used.
The longitudinal study provided valuable insights into the use of navigation tools. To understand the reasons behind this tool use, two task-centric observations of electronic document navigation were conducted. The first asked participants to perform a series of specific navigation tasks while AppMonitor logged their actions. The second was performed as a series of interactive sessions, where users performed a particular task and were then probed on their tool choice. These
two studies found that many users are not aware of the advanced navigation tools that could significantly improve their navigation efficiency.
Finally, the characterisations highlighted within-document revisitation as a commonly performed task, with current tools that support this action rarely used. To address this problem, the analysis, design and evaluation of a Footprints Scrollbar
is presented. It places marks inside the scrollbar trough and provides shortcuts to aid users return to previously visited locations. The Footprints Scrollbar was significantly faster and subjectively preferred over a standard scrollbar for revisitation
tasks.
To summarise, this thesis contributes a literature review of document navigation
and electronic document navigation tools; the design and implementation of
AppMonitor—a tool to monitor user actions in unmodified Windows applications; a longitudinal study describing the navigation actions users perform; two taskcentric studies examining why actions are performed; and the Footprints Scrollbar, a tool to aid within-document revisitation tasks.
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Macvean, Andrew Peter. "Understanding the exergame user experience : users' motivation, attitude and behaviour in a location-aware pervasive exergame for adolescent children." Thesis, Heriot-Watt University, 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/10399/2825.
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The benefits of physical activity for adolescent children are well understood. Despite this, within much of the Western World, children fail to achieve the recommended guidelines for physical activity participation, spending too much time on sedentary activities. Thanks to recent progressions in ubiquitous technologies, exergames - exercise video games - have emerged as a potential solution to the problem. By facilitating physical activity, and encouraging behavioural change within an enjoyable and motivating context, exergames have the potential to remove some of the barriers preventing many adolescents from sufficient physical activity participation. There are, however, few studies of exergame systems that have looked at the impact of the system over time. Additionally, many systems are not evaluated within ecologically valid contexts. The result of this is a lack of real understanding on the efficacy of exergame systems and their feasibility as a valid solution. This thesis investigates the design, development, and evaluation of a locationaware exergame for adolescent children: iFitQuest. Through analysis of two prolonged use school-based evaluations, this research provides evidence on the ability of exergames to facilitate physical activity and reduce sedentary behaviour, when targeted at adolescent children within a school context. The results of two evaluations suggest that iFitQuest was enjoyable, motivating, and physically demanding, with the ability to promote physical activity of all intensities in players with a range of attitudes towards physical activity, their own physical activity abilities, and physical activity participation backgrounds. The primary contribution of this thesis is the indepth evaluation of the exergame user experience. Looking beyond the general success of the system, the experience of individual players was analysed through the lens of Bandura's theory of self-efficacy. Through a mixed-methods case study analysis, self-efficacy was established as an accurate method to explain and understand in-game behaviour, in particular with respect to goal setting and game selection habits. By influencing and moderating the players' motivation, attitude and in-game behaviour, self-efficacy was established as a useful tool for future exergame practitioners. Guidelines on the application of self-efficacy are provided, with respect to both analysis and design. Additionally, through a naturalistic and prolonged evaluation, a number of logistical and contextual lessons for the evaluation of exergames were established. In particular, the use of a user-centred design approach for the development of similar systems is validated through a series of design guidelines, which account for the importance and influence of the evaluation context.
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Bulgurcu, Burcu. "Understanding the information privacy-related perceptions and behaviors of an online social network user." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/43380.
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The popularity of Online Social Networks (OSNs) has posed substantial challenges to users in protection of their information privacy. Academic research in this area is still limited in scope and depth. Given the paucity of research in this domain, the following research aims to further our understanding of information privacy in OSNs by focusing on users’ information privacy-related perceptions and behavioral responses. To fulfill this objective, one conceptual and two empirical studies have been conducted in this thesis.
The objective of Study #1 is to develop a theoretical foundation for users’ privacy-related perceptions and behavioral responses by integrating two major literatures on coping and information privacy. This study forms the foundation for the theory and methodology of the subsequent two empirical studies.
The objective of Study #2 is to develop an empirical understanding of the factors that affect a user’s motivation to cope with a privacy threat associated with using a social application. Drawing on the data collected from 197 Facebook users, the study shows that factors such as a user’s benefit, privacy threat, and threat avoidability perceptions are influential on his privacy threat coping motivations.
The objective of Study #3 is to empirically investigate the factors that shape a user’s privacy threat perception, and in turn, his intention to use a social application. Drawing on the data collected from 747 Facebook users, the study reveals that while permission request (i.e., the extent of permissions requested by an application to access, process, and utilize a user’s personal information) can increase a user’s privacy threat perceptions, this effect can be reduced by privacy control (i.e., the extent of privacy safeguards provided by an application to enable a user to customize the requested permissions according to his privacy preferences).
Overall, this research contributes to the literature by furthering our understanding of (1) an OSN user’s perceptions and behaviors that can increase his vulnerability to privacy invasions, (2) the processes by which a user copes with a privacy threat associated with his use of an OSN feature, (3) the factors that affect his privacy threat perceptions and intentions to use an OSN feature.
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Kaltenbacher, Bridgette Gertraude. "Intuitive interaction steps towards an integral understanding of the user experience in interaction design." Thesis, Goldsmiths College (University of London), 2009. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.514297.
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Zhou, Qiyang. "Understanding User Behaviors of Creative Practice on Short Video Sharing Platforms – A Case Study of TikTok and Bilibili." University of Cincinnati / OhioLINK, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin155421202112545.
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Scarr, Joseph Laurence. "Understanding and Exploiting Spatial Memory in the Design of Efficient Command Selection Interfaces." Thesis, University of Canterbury. Computer Science and Software Engineering, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/10092/9326.
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Humans have a strong natural ability to remember item locations. In graphical user interfaces, this ability is one of the primary mechanisms by which users become efficient. However, there are two ways in which modern applications often fail to exploit the potential of spatial memory. First, they overuse hierarchical structures such as cascading menus, which slows down interaction for expert users who already know item locations; and second, they move items around, most commonly in response to changing display geometry. The three goals of this thesis are therefore to (1) develop a better understanding of human spatial memory in the context of user interfaces; (2) design and validate efficient command-selection interfaces based on the strength of spatial memory; and (3) design and validate interface strategies that allow users to maintain spatial memory even when display geometry changes.
Addressing goal (1), a comprehensive literature review of spatial memory for user interfaces is presented. The review covers underlying psychological models of spatial memory, the observable properties of spatial memory, and existing applications of spatial memory to human-computer interaction. In addition to informing the research in this thesis, the review is intended to provide a useful summary of the state of spatial memory research for scientists in HCI, as well as providing a set of design guidelines on spatial memory for practitioners.
Addressing goal (2), this thesis presents the design and evaluation of two related user interface techniques, CommandMaps and StencilMaps. The CommandMap is a spatially stable interface with a flattened hierarchy, intended as a replacement for cascading menu systems. Theoretical performance predictions indicate that CommandMaps should be significantly faster than traditional user interfaces such as menus and the Microsoft Office Ribbon, and laboratory-based empirical studies of command selection confirm these predictions. These positive results motivated the design and implementation of two real-world CommandMap user interfaces based on Microsoft Word and Pinta (an open-source image editing application). Evaluation results confirmed that CommandMaps continue to demonstrate performance and subjective advantages in the context of actual tasks, including interleaved command selection, typing, and direct manipulation. Qualitative data gathered from interviews, questionnaires, and conversations provide substantial insight into users' reactions to CommandMaps, leading to a set of design recommendations regarding when and how they should be implemented in real applications.
One design limitation identified during CommandMap evaluations was that novice users could be initially overwhelmed by the number of controls displayed at once. To address this concern, an extension to the CommandMap, called a StencilMap, was designed and evaluated. By using a stencil overlay to de-emphasise more advanced controls, the StencilMap directs users' visual search to a subset of controls they are most likely to need. Then, when novice users progress to the full interface, they can utilise their existing knowledge of command locations. An initial study shows that stencils are more effective at guiding visual search than ephemeral adaptation, another subset emphasis technique; however, users' spatial learning decreases as the amount of guidance increases. A second study compared StencilMaps to a palette-based subset interface, which displays the most likely commands in a ready-to-hand tool panel. Results show that StencilMaps enable stronger learning of the full UI compared to the palette approach.
Addressing goal (3), this thesis presents an investigation of how interfaces can be adapted to changing interface constraints while still supporting the user's memory for item locations. A human factors study on spatially consistent transformations was conducted, with results showing that people's spatial memory is only minimally disrupted by geometric transformations (such as scaling, translation, or perspective distortion), as long as the set of items in a display is transformed as a whole. This idea is then applied to a file browser layout: by scaling the item grid when the parent window is resized, rather than reflowing items, memory for item locations can be maintained. A second study validates this idea, showing that a scaling interface outperforms both reflow and scrolling-based techniques for revisitation when windows are resized.
In summary, the contributions of this thesis are: (1) an in-depth literature review of spatial memory in psychology and HCI, which is intended to inform designers and future researchers as well as the material in this thesis; (2) the design, implementation and evaluation of a new interface, the CommandMap, which shows that spatial stability and hierarchy flattening enable a high ceiling of expert performance; (3) the design of a stencil overlay technique to help novice users find commands, and an evaluation highlighting the key trade-off between helping users and allowing them to learn; and (4) empirical evidence showing that most types of whole-interface transformations have a small effect on spatial memory, and that correspondingly, scaling interfaces outperform reflowing interfaces under changing window constraints.
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Saedi, Dimen, and Per Danielsson. "Business Intelligence: Understanding disparity in information interpretation." Thesis, Karlstads universitet, Fakulteten för hälsa, natur- och teknikvetenskap (from 2013), 2018. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kau:diva-66468.
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The purpose of this study is to understand how business intelligence and the information it provides is interpreted by two different groups of people - the business users and the technical team in a BI system. To fulfill the purpose of the research an analytical process with an interpretive approach has been used. Through the Gioia methodology the study was conducted as a single case study at a staffing agency located in Sweden with approximately 800 employees. Eight interviews were conducted at the company with four members from the technical team and four members from the business users. The findings of this study shows that two aggregated dimensions have emerged - Use of BI and Nature of BI. The empirical investigation show a clear difference between the technical team and the business users perception of BI, which is highlighted by the emerged aggregated dimensions and the coherent second order themes. To conclude, this demonstrates that there are not only technical challenges with BI, but also intangible challenges. This means that there are disparities in understanding BI, as well as there are disparities in interpreting the information it provides.Syftet med denna studie är att förstå hur Business Intelligence och den tillhörande informationen tolkas av två olika grupper av människor - the business users och the technical team i ett BI system. För att uppfylla syftet med forskningen har en analysprocess med en tolkningsmetod utförts. Genom Gioia-metoden har studien genomförts som en enskild fallstudie hos en bemanningsbyrå i Sverige med cirka 800 anställda. Åtta intervjuer genomfördes på företaget med fyra medlemmar från the technical team och fyra medlemmar från the business users. Resultatet av denna studie visar att två aggregerade dimensioner har uppstått - Use of BI och Nature of BI. Den empiriska undersökningen visar en tydlig skillnad mellan the technical team och the business users uppfattning om BI, vilket framhävs av de uppkomna aggregerade dimensionerna och de sammanhängande andra ordningens teman. Avslutningsvis visar detta att det inte bara finns tekniska utmaningar med BI utan även immateriella utmaningar. Det betyder att det finns skillnader i att förstå BI, och att det finns skillnader i tolkningen av den information som BI tillhandahåller.
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Williams, Karen Lindsay. "Personas in the Design Process: A tool for understanding others." Thesis, Available online, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2006, 2006. http://etd.gatech.edu/theses/available/etd-07102006-101208/.
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Hyman, Jack Alan. "Towards an Understanding of Mobile Website Contextual Usability and its Impact on Mobile Commerce." NSUWorks, 2012. http://nsuworks.nova.edu/gscis_etd/183.
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An increasing number of technologies and applications have begun to focus on mobile computing and the wireless Web as a way to conduct commerce-oriented transactions. M-commerce Websites that are usability friendly must emphasize information quality, system quality, and service quality, as these are proxy measures to mobile commerce user satisfaction (MCUS). Measureable variables can help researchers to understand how satisfaction induces users to return to a Website. Although several studies on m-commerce user satisfaction focus on content quality, appearance, service quality, and ease of use, the results of these studies were inconclusive because they do not address contextual usability barriers for the mobile Web.
The task context, which consist of two activities, search and transaction, is a prominent contextual factor that affects mobile usability positively or negatively in achieving MCUS. The researcher determined what end user expectations and actual usage beliefs result in disconfirmation or MCUS. An empirical field study of an online retailer and search platform was conducted using a sampling of 98 participants. The participants used a smartphone to search and complete a transaction in the participant's natural setting.
The study results indicated that expectations and usability measures including efficiency, errors, and flexibility significantly influence actual usage leading to MCUS. The original Expectation Confirmation Theory (ECT) model assumed that user's expectations could lead to actual usage. However, in the modified ECT model, it is the actual usage experience itself that determines MCUS. Disconfirmation is an inconsistent measure tied to actual usage, purchase intent, or satisfaction as mobile users often make purchases from m-commerce Websites because of convenience, flexibility, efficiency, and accessibility. If the user experiences an error during the search or transaction activity, such a drawback can cost a mobile Website future traffic, the loss of a transaction, and lead to lower levels of satisfaction.
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Mojadadi, Abdul Rahman. "The influence of interfaces on the understanding of Mathematics in secondary schools in Afghanistan." Thesis, University of the Western Cape, 2010. http://etd.uwc.ac.za/index.php?module=etd&action=viewtitle&id=gen8Srv25Nme4_9996_1306737536.
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he focus of this research is to establish whether there is a difference in the way the genders perceive the visualization of mathematics, with specific reference to set theory. The influence of the computing experience of students on their perceptions was also investigated. Interfaces were created for the teaching of set theory for learners in the first class of secondary school. Since the mother tongue of most the pupils is Dari the interface was made available in both Dari and English. The interfaces were used to gather the data for the researc