DESIGNING *for humans

Podcast - User Researcher's Tool Kit

The User Researcher's Tool Kit:

Rob Tannen, IDSA, director of human factors at Electronic Ink and vice chair of IDSA's Human Factors Section, discusses the current and future tools for conducting and analyzing how people interact with technology. To access this mp3 file, visit: http://commpartners.client.ninesystems.com/IDSA/podcasts/media/4609553.mp3

This file can also be downloaded from the iTunes store - search for "IDSA".

Note that this podcast references the user research tool survey conducted in 2006:

http://humanfactors.typepad.com/idsa/2006/12/survey_results_.html

User Research at Microsoft

MIT's Technology Review (a HIGHLY recommend newsletter) has an interview with Rick Rashid, Director of Microsoft Research.  Rashid gives some thoughtful answers to some rather confrontational questions regarding the state of innovation at Microsoft, and singles out interface adaptation as a key feature for improving usability.  He also refers to Microsoft's SenseCam project, a wearable camera for capturing everyday life events, as a memory-aid or "black box". It has clear value to ethnographic research, although it's current design seems to be a bit too bulky and obtrusive.

Survey Results: Technology for User Research

This past fall the IDSA Human Factors section conducted an online survey to gather data on technologies used to conduct user research.  We had nearly eighty responses.  The information was used in a recent Usability Professionals Association presentation in New York on Technologies for User Research (TURe).  Edited presentation materials, that describe the survey results, may be downloaded from that site (the presentation breaks-down the results between product design and interaction design).  The research will also be discussed in an upcoming IDSA podcast (TBA).

Thanks to everyone who responded.  I have summarized some of the findings below, and attached two files with more detailed data. 

Key Findings:

78 respondents (39 in product design, 47 in interaction design; small overlap between groups)

Overall technology utilization in user research:

• Video Cameras - 61%
• Surveys - 58%
• Software Analytics - 60%
• Computer-Based Video - 35%
• Journals/Diaries/Blogging - 30%
• Remote Testing Tools - 22%
• Physiological Data Tools - 15%
• Eye Tracking - 11%

General Feedback:

• 48%  feel limited by current user research technology
• 53% believe user research lags behind technology that is subject of research
• 51% plan to upgrade user research technology within year
• 33% have created custom technology tools or solutions for user research

Data Files:

• HTML Summary Data (no drill-down): Download User_Research_Technology_Summary.html
• Detailed Excel Data: Download User_Research_Technology_detail.xls

Collecting Examples of User Research Tools

The IDSA Human Factors section is gathering examples of tools and technology used for user research. 

If you have shareable examples (photos, videos, case studies), of the tools that you or your firm uses to gather information on product usage, field research, anthropometric measures, etc., please forward to Rob Tannen at [email protected]

We're especially interested in unique or custom solutions that have been created to measure or document how people use products or systems.

Innovation Design Research Issue now online

Selected articles from the Summer 2006 issue of IDSA's Innovation are available online, including:

Digital Ethnography: Sparking Brilliant Innovation
Darrel Rhea, IDSA, CEO, Cheskin, and Lisa Leckle, account management director, Cheskin

Market Research Today: How to Stay on Target
Forrest Elizabeth Folsom, marketing communications manager, Herbst LaZar Bell, Inc.

A Visit with the Chair Man
Bruce Sterling, novelist, journalist, columnist for Wired magazine and the former Visionary in Residence at the Art Center College of Design.

You may also download:

The Future of User Research Ubiquitous Computing - Rob Tannen, PhD, IDSA - Posits that many of the constraints of current research methods may be overcome through the development of product usage measurement technology.  You may download Tannen's artice:  innovation_tannen.pdf.