A Comprehensive Model of Usability Based on Meta-Synthesis

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 PhD Student of Industrial Design, Department of Industrial Design, School of Visual Arts, College of Fine Arts, Tehran University, Tehran, Iran.

2 Assistant Professor, Department of Industrial Design, Faculty of Art, Semnan University, Semnan, Iran.

Abstract

 
Today, we are witnessing the increasing expansion of websites, applications and computer systems, each of which, according to its characteristics, responds to a series of modern human needs. However, many of these products are rejected by users despite their huge costs. The reason for this is the inability of the product to provide favorable interaction conditions with users and the inability of users to achieve their goals and meet their needs. In other words, the low quality and inefficiency of interactive projects causes their failure. One of the most important factors affecting the quality of systems and products is usability. Usability is one of the main concepts in the field of interactive design and user experience design. This concept is a criterion for evaluating the acceptability of interactive systems and products in the opinion of users. Various models and definitions have been presented for this concept up to now; But each of the usability models have considered distinct components according to different definitions, and based on this, a comprehensive model that covers most of the factors affecting the process of interaction between the user and the product is missing. Identifying the components and factors effective on usability and then providing a comprehensive definition of it, can have a great impact on the accurate and favorable evaluation process of this concept. Based on this, this research has been done with the aim of providing a comprehensive view of the concept of usability. In line with the mentioned goal, the following questions were formulated:
What components do the existing and presented models of usability have? In the presented models, how is the relationship between the concepts and usability components, and how much do they overlap? How can usability models be integrated in the form of a comprehensive model and what characteristics will this model have?
For this purpose, the provided usability models were extracted from the research literature and their common and distinctive aspects were examined using the qualitative meta-synthesis method in order to identify all the factors affecting the interaction process. Then, by synthesizing the related components, the core components of the usability model were determined. The result of this process is a comprehensive conceptual model that displays usability components in relation to the user and the product, as well as the stages of the interaction process. According to this model, the concept of usability is not a feature unique to systems or products, but is defined as a feature of the process of interaction between a specific user and a specific system or product in a specific field of use. This model can be used to design various interactive systems and products. Also, can be used to evaluate the usability of different products, services and systems and can be a basis for designing a questionnaire or checklist for usability evaluation. The effect of the context of use on usability was not considered in this research and it can be one of the concerns of future researches.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

باقری طالقانی، ابراهیم (1399)، تحلیلی بر مفهوم و کاربرد پیش خورد در طراحی تعاملی، نامه هنرهای تجسمی و کاربردی، 13 (29). 39-54. https://doi.org/10.30480/vaa.2020.2804.1436
باقری طالقانی، ابراهیم (1394)، کاربرد روانشناسی شناختی در طراحی صنعتی، تهران : سازمان مطالعه و تدوین کتب علوم انسانی دانشگاه‌ها (سمت).
باقری طالقانی، ابراهیم (1393)، مفاهیم کاربردی نظریه افردنس، از روانشناسی تا فرایند طراحی، هنرهای زیبا – هنرهای تجسمی، 19 (3)، 55-64. https://doi.org/10.22059/jfava.2014.55412
باقری طالقانی، ابراهیم، افهمی، رضا و چوپانکاره، وحید (1397)، طراحی افردنس چندسطحی به منظور ارتقای کاربردپذیری محصولات تعاملی، هنرهای زیبا – هنرهای تجسمی، 23 (4)، 103-112. https://doi.org/10.22059/jfava.2018.240450.665721
عابدی جعفری، عابد و امیری، مجتبی (1398)، فرا ترکیب، روشی برای سنتز مطالعات کیفی. روش شناسی علوم انسانی، 25 (99). 73-87. https://doi.org/10.30471/mssh.2019.1629
Abran, A., Khelifi, A., Suryn, W., & Seffah, A. (2003). Usability meanings and interpretations in ISO standards. Software quality journal, 11, 325-338. http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A:1025869312943
Alonso-Ríos, D., Vázquez-García, A., Mosqueira-Rey, E., & Moret-Bonillo, V. (2009). Usability: a critical analysis and a taxonomy. International journal of human-computer interaction, 26(1), 53-74. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10447310903025552
Alshamari, M., & Mayhew, P. (2009). Technical review: Current issues of usability testing. IETE technical review, 26(6), 402-406. https://doi.org/10.4103/0256-4602.57825
Bevana, N., Kirakowskib, J., & Maissela, J. (1991). What is usability. In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on HCI, 1-6.
Constantine, L. L., & Lockwood, L. A. (1999). Software for use: a practical guide to the models and methods of usage-centered design. Pearson Education.
Diefenbach, S., Kolb, N., & Hassenzahl, M. (2014). The'hedonic'in human-computer interaction: history, contributions, and future research directions. In Proceedings of the 2014 conference on Designing interactive systems, 305-314. https://doi.org/10.1145/2598510.2598549
Eason, K. D. (1984). Towards the experimental study of usability. Behaviour & Information Technology, 3(2), 133-143. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01449298408901744
Erwin, E. J., Brotherson, M. J., & Summers, J. A. (2011). Understanding qualitative metasynthesis: Issues and opportunities in early childhood intervention research. Journal of Early Intervention, 33(3), 186-200. https://doi.org/10.1177/1053815111425493
Fernandez, A., Abrahão, S., & Insfran, E. (2012). A systematic review on the effectiveness of web usability evaluation methods. In 16th International Conference on Evaluation & Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE 2012), Ciudad Real, 2012, 52-56, doi: 10.1049/ic.2012.0007
Fernandez, A., Insfran, E., & Abrahão, S. (2011). Usability evaluation methods for the web: A systematic mapping study. Information and software Technology, 53(8), 789-817. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infsof.2011.02.007 Hassan, H. M., & Galal-Edeen, G. H. (2017). From usability to user experience. In 2017 International Conference on Intelligent Informatics and Biomedical Sciences (ICIIBMS), 216-222. IEEE. http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/ICIIBMS.2017.8279761
Heckhausen, H., & Kuhl, J. (1985). From wishes to action: The dead end and short cut on the long way to action. In M.Frese, & J. Sabini (Eds.), Goal directed behavior: The concept of action in psychology. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003150749
Jetter, C., & Gerken, J. (2007). A simplified model of user experience for practical application. In NordiCHI 2006, Oslo: The 2nd COST294-MAUSE International Open Workshop" User eXperience-Towards a unified view", 106-111.
Lewis, J. R. (2014). Usability: lessons learned… and yet to be learned. International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, 30(9), 663-684. https://doi.org/10.1080/10447318.2014.930311
Madan, A., & Dubey, S. K. (2012). Usability evaluation methods: a literature review. International Journal of Engineering Science and Technology, 4(2), 590-599.
Major, C., & Savin-Baden, M. (2010). An introduction to qualitative research synthesis: Managing the information explosion in social science research. New York, NY: Routledge. http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203497555
Matera, M., Rizzo, F., & Carughi, G. T. (2006). Web usability: Principles and evaluation methods. Web engineering, 143-180. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-28218-1_5
Nielsen, J. (1994). Usability engineering. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, San Francisco, Calif.
Rajanen, D., Clemmensen, T., Iivari, N., Inal, Y., Rızvanoğlu, K., Sivaji, A., & Roche, A. (2017). UX professionals’ definitions of usability and UX–A comparison between Turkey, Finland, Denmark, France and Malaysia. In Human-Computer Interaction–INTERACT 2017: 16th IFIP TC 13 International Conference, Mumbai, India, September 25-29, 2017, Proceedings, Part IV 16 (218-239). Springer International Publishing. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-68059-0_14 Seffah, A., Donyaee, M., Kline, R. B., & Padda, H. K. (2006). Usability measurement and metrics: A consolidated model. Software quality journal, 14, 159-178. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11219-006-7600-8
Shackel, B. (1986). Ergonomics in design for usability. In Proceedings of the Second Conference of the British Computer Society, human computer interaction specialist group on People and computers: designing for usability, 44-64.
Sharp, H., & Rogers, Y., Preece, J. (2019). Interaction design: beyond human-computer interaction. John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken; NJ; United States.
Shneiderman, B. (1998). Designing the User Interface, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, USA.
Thomas, R. L. (1998). Elements of performance and satisfaction as indicators of the usability of digital spatial interfaces for information-seeking: Implications for ISLA. PhD dissertation, University of Southern California.
Quesenbery, W. (2001). What does usability mean: Looking beyondease of use'. In Annual conference-society for technical communication, 48, 432-436.
Quesenbery, W. (2003). Dimensions of usability. In Albers, M., & Mazur, B., Content and complexity: Information design in technical communication. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erbaum Associates.
Quesenbery, W. (2004). Balancing the 5Es of usability. Cutter IT Journal, 17(2), 4-11.
Winter, S., Wagner, S., Deissenboeck, F. (2007). A comprehensive model of usability. In Proc. IFIP Int. Conf. Eng. Hum.-Comput. Interact. Berlin, Germany: Springer, 106- 122. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.1612.04598
Journal of Fine Arts: Visual Arts
Volume 29, Issue 1
May 2024
Pages 7-22

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics