HCI Research Group Seminars
Summer Term 2008
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 23 April (Wednesday) |
Andrew Adams School of Systems Engineering University of Reading |
HCI Challenges in Security |
| 1 May | DVD | Relative Confusion |
| 8 May | William Newman visiting professor, UCLIC |
Temporal structures in conversation, and how computer usage interferes |
| 15 May | Mark Blythe | Tenori On HCI |
| 22 May | Paul Vickers University of Northumbria |
Perception vs Intention: International & Cultural Influences on Semiotic Transformations Between [The Two Cultures] Squared |
| 29 May | Victor M. Gonzalez Manchester Business School |
Personal Task-Management: Key Challenges For Designing Interactive Support Tools |
| 5 June | Daniel Kudenko Department of Computer Science |
(Postponed)Interactive Drama |
| 12 June | Gilbert Cockton University of Sunderland |
Grounding Design Purpose: Properties, Qualities or Worth? |
| 19 June | Thomas Green | Ten years of cognitive dimensions |
| 16 July (09.00) |
Chris Newell | 'Liveness' in Computer Speech |
Abstracts
23 April
Andrew Adams: HCI Challenges in Security
Dr Adams is involved in a number of "security" research projects funded by various bodies. His involvement is in the social and legal implications of the technology being developed, and how it might be deployed and used. As part of this work, the challenges of HCI for the field of security, are becoming evident. In this talk he presents some of the findings of his analysis of security technology research.
As with computer systems of earlier generations, the interface elements of security technology are often the most overlooked. Just as the early nuclear power plants had impossible interfaces, so too do the CCTV control rooms that mushroomed in the 80s and 90s. People are part of the system, in the case of security they are the operators and the subjects, good and bad, of the system. People are much trickier than machines, as HCI practitioners well know. Security technology research must begin to spend significantly more efforts on the interfaces of their systems to avoid being expensive white elephants that in the end do more harm than good in security terms.
1 May
Relative Confusion
This is a DVD of a short play, produced by the University of Dundee. It follows the story of three older siblings who are attempting to move into the modern age with the use of digital television. It traces the problems that they have - some of which may be exaggerated by age-related effects, but some of which may be all to familiar to us all.
There will be time for some discussion of the implications of the characters' experiences.
8th May
William Newman: Temporal structures in conversation, and how computer usage
interferes
Computers are often used by participants in conversations. For example, doctors use computers during consultations to access patients' records, and attendees at meetings may use their laptops to take notes. I will describe observational studies of these and other settings, which have exposed temporal structures in conversation that can be disrupted when computers are used, in ways that rarely occur when pen and paper are used instead. I will suggest that there are important performance requirements to consider when designing any software that could be used in conversational settings.
15 May
Mark Blythe: Tenori-On HCI
The Tenori On is a new musical instrument by Japanese artist / designer Toshio Iwai. It is part sequencer and part sampler and the interface is made up of a grid of lights which the user activates to make loops of sound. It is rather spiffing and I thought anyone interested in interaction design might like to play with it. I'll bring one to the session and perhaps we will be able to create a group composition. We might also have a clever and insightful discussion about aesthetics, enjoyment and"post-usability" HCI.
In short, I've got a new gadget and I'll let you have a go. There's a link to
a youtube demo by Toshio Iwai here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE-lJzKIzDE
(I am not as good at using it as he is)
22 May
Paul Vickers: Perception vs Intention: International & Cultural
Influences on Semiotic Transformations Between [The Two
Cultures] Squared
In a collaborative interdisciplinary project I am working with colleagues from the School of Creative Media at RMIT University (Melbourne, Australia) to study the effects of cultural differences on the relationship between perceived and intended meanings of narrative content of visual and auditory artefacts created by students in the UK and Australia. Students on Northumbria's Multimedia Computing and Multimedia & Digital Entertainment programmes take the Level 5 module Multimedia Time-based Assets. For part of their assessment these students are required to produce non-speech auditory narratives which are informed by research in the Auditory Display area. In this project students have produced an auditory ident which is then interpreted by students on RMIT's Digital Photography course who are required to produce a photographic narrative which they feel captures the essential meaning of the auditory ident. In a reciprocal task, RMIT students also produce a photographic ident which is transformed by Northumbria students into a non-speech auditory narrative. A major feature of this project is to explore the differences between the artefacts' intended and perceived meanings and what effects, if any, the role of culture (both national and discipline-based) played in this process.
29 May
Victor M. Gonzalez: Key Challenges For
Designing Interactive Support Tools
Many recent studies provide evidence of the challenges experienced by knowledge workers while multi-tasking among several projects and initiatives. Work is often interrupted, and this commonly results in people leaving activities pending until they have the time, information, resources or energy to reassume them. Among the different types of knowledge workers, those working directly with Information Technology (IT) or offering IT services - software developers, support engineers, systems administrators or database managers -, experience particularly challenging scenarios of multi-tasking given the varied, crisis-driven and reactive nature of their work. Previous recommendations and technological solutions to ameliorate these challenges give limited attention to individual's preferences and to understanding how and what tools and strategies could be better to benefit IT service workers as individuals. Based on the analysis of characteristics of IT service work and a consolidation of findings regarding personal activity management processes, this talk will present the design of a software tool to support those processes and discuss preliminary findings of its usage by four IT service workers over a period of six weeks. We found that the tool has been used for short periods, but it is quite effective for enhancing the organization and constant revision of activity, as well as provides adequate level of flexibility to support the varied nature of IT-service work.
Brief bio:
Dr. Victor M. Gonzalez is a Lecturer in Human-Computer Interaction and member of
the Information Systems and Interactive Systems Group at the University of
Manchester. He studies the psychological and sociological implications of
information technologies; focusing on analyzing the 'praxis' of work, the
personal and social spheres of human activity and on designing and evaluating
information technologies. Dr. Gonzalez is a Senior Research Fellow of CRITO
(Centre for Research on Information Technology and Organizations) at the
University of California at Irvine, USA. He received a Ph.D. and Master degrees
in Information and Computer Science from the University of California at Irvine
and a Master degree in Telecommunications and Information Systems from the
University of Essex, United Kingdom.
12 June
Gilbert Cockton: Grounding Design Purpose: Properties, Qualities or Worth?
Approaches to Interaction Design tend to focus on the properties of the
artefact or the qualities of the interaction, with an empirical bias in HCI from
the 1980s suppressing more artefact-centred approaches from computer science.
Such a shift from artefact to use happened at least 25 years earlier within
product design, which has subsequently moved on to consider the meaning of
products, the design of product(-service) systems and the value created by
design.
In this talk I will briefly review the history of product design in the
twentieth century and consider whether Interaction Design needs to catch up with
contemporary design thinking. To some extent, the recent focus on user
experience has brought approaches from 1980s design into HCI (especially the
philosophies of the Memphis Group), but there has been less focus firstly on
product ecologies and secondly on design as the creation of value. I will
illustrate what both can mean in design, and consider whether and how we could
'catch up' with product-service system design and focus on achieved value rather
than the artefact or usage as the generic purpose of design.
My argument will be that we need to focus on all three, that is, the artefact,
usage and value, but within an integrating framework around the idea of worth as
the achieved balance between the costs and (valuable) benefits of ownership and
usage. I will argue that a focus on value alone is incompatible with the
nature of designing, and that the concept of value is inadequate for
understanding the human choices that make some designs successful and others
failures. While this is all fine in theory, there is a much more important
question of what this means for practice. I will briefly answer this by
introducing six meta-principles for designing and a framework of novel
worth-centred approaches to Interaction Design.
Gilbert Cockton has been Research Chair in HCI at the University of Sunderland
since 1997, where he has directed a combination of research programmes on design
and evaluation methods and extreme accessibility alongside large regional
and national support projects for the digital sector. From Autumn 2005 to
the end of 2007, his research into value- and worth-centred development was
funded by a NESTA fellowship and a visiting researcher post at Microsoft
Research Cambridge. Gilbert has been an active contributor to HCI
activities through Interaction (formerly the BCS British HCI Group, former group
chair), ACM SIGCHI (co-chairing CHI 2003) and IFIP (former vice-chair of TC13).
19th June
T R G Green: Ten years of cognitive dimensions
The Cognitive Dimensions framework (mainly but not exclusively created by me) has been around for ages, quite long enough to comment on how well it worked out - an evaluation of an information structure designed for evaluating information structures. So, first a quick sketch of the story so far for those who missed earlier episodes, in which I shall emphasise that it can be applied to all kinds of information structures (yes, including Hampton Court Maze) - it's not limited to HCI. Then I shall offer my assessment of how far it met its original aims: easy-to-learn broad-brush evaluation offering a unified vocabulary for evaluation. And to end with, a few thoughts on aspects that have yet to be properly explored, such as how notations can collaborate, one being used for some parts of a process and another being used for other parts; and how the development of a notation over time can be affected by 'notational economics'.
Abstracts for postponed seminars
1 May (Postponed - to be re-arranged)
Patrick Olivier: Culture Technologies
Links:
I'll be talking about the research I've been involved in since moving from York to Newcastle University just over 3 years ago. In conventional terms this might be described as pervasive interaction design, that is, interaction in situated and mobile settings (e.g. Ambient Kitchen, Tabletop Interfaces, Digital Jewellery). More interestingly though I am developing a strand of interdisciplinary research that I call 'Cultural Technologies' which seeks to explore richness of human experience and personal relations, and use this understanding to develop technology that make people's lives more meaningful. Sounds fluffy (I know), but it is becoming increasingly clear that technologists need to look beyond the confines of their own disciplines if they are to address the problem of creating technology that enhances, rather than diminishes, our experience of the world. Cultural Technologies seek to enable this by facilitating research collaborations between computing scientists, electronic engineers, and researchers in the arts, humanities and social sciences. Interdisciplinary approaches are already apparent in some areas of computing science research, such as human-computer interaction and systems design, where techniques from anthropology and sociology have helped computer scientists address some of the richness of real-world settings. Cultural Technologies engages architects, musicians, artists, film makers and social scientists in the exploration of the nature of people's encounters with technology, in particular, in relation the everyday scenarios envisaged by proponents of pervasive computing -- a future in which technology is integrated into the very fabric of the world around us. I'll be sticking around for the afternoon too...
Autumn Term 2008
16 October
Mark Blythe
This paper describes the development and evaluation of “weegie” an audio-photography desk featuring sounds and images inspired by the Govan area of Glasgow. It was intended to be an interactive artwork that would challenge negative preconceptions about the area. The paper describes two techniques used to consider the extent to which the piece achieved these aims. The first technique is the “personal meaning map” and taken from museum studies. The second is cultural critique drawn from the arts. Building on Gaver’s strategy of using cultural commentators for ‘polyphonic’ assessment it considers the extent to which perspectives drawn from the humanities and the arts can be useful in evaluating design. It argues that a more rigorous understanding of critical theory is necessary to the development of interaction design criticism.
23 October
André Pimenta Freire: A survey on the accessibility awareness of people involved
in web development projects in Brazil
Accessibility has become a very important issue to promote inclusion in the Information Society, and people involved in Web development projects have a very important role to contribute with the development of a more inclusive Web. In this talk, I will present an investigation on the accessibility awareness of people involved in Web development in Brazil. We have conducted the research by means of an exploratory survey with a Web based questionnaire and a sample with subjects from academy, industry and government. The study had 613 valid answers and involved representatives from all of the 27 states of Brazil. The results show that accessibility is still far from being actually considered in Web development projects in Brazil, as only 19.9% of the participants have stated that accessibility is considered in their projects. The lack of education on accessibility, as well as the poor spread of the Brazilian accessibility law are important issues to be dealt with to boost a stronger accessibility awareness among people involved in Web development.
The presentation should be mostly about the results previously presented at the W4A'08 conference: http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1368044.1368064
Speaker: André Pimenta Freire
André is a new research student, working with Helen. In this seminar he will be reporting work that he carried out as part of his master's research.
30 October
Dave Swallow: Who supports the support workers? E-learning for support workers
of students with disabilities
This paper discusses the results of an investigation regarding the support of people with disabilities in educational settings. The results indicated a lack of standardization in training and gaps in the knowledge and attitudes of educational professionals regarding how to appropriately support people with disabilities in higher and further education. The paper discusses a pilot project for offering workplace training on skills and techniques for a group of educational professionals, support workers of people with disabilities, through an online course in a virtual learning environment.
6 November
Andrew Monk: Combining the social and the individual: fun,
conversation and social networks
An alternative sub-title for this talk could have been "what I learned from Darren Reed". This was, that sociologists in general, and ethnomethodologists in particular, think about human behaviour at the level of the group while psychologist like myself think at the level of the individual. In this talk I will very briefly outline three areas where I think that these two approaches can be combined, i.e., where it is possible to say something specific about the interface between the social and the individual.
The first of these areas is Darren's work on conversational flow that can be thought of as using behaviour as an indicator of user experience (fun). This was further developed into a successful behavioural measure of fun in photo sharing by Siân Lindsey. The second area is Clark's theory of language use. Clark uses the concepts of common ground and joint action to provide what is essentially a cognitive model of conversation. Finally, I will consider the area of simulated societies by demonstrating some of my beginner's efforts with NetLogo. My task here is demonstrate emergent social phenomena in the simulated social networks of older people. That is to compare the resilience of networks "grown" in different ways to the removal of individual nodes (death!)
13 November
Janet Finlay: Representations of Practice
To improve educational practice it is necessary be exposed to, to reflect on, and to incorporate the excellent practices of others. But transfer of practice is recognised as a complex process in higher education, in professional education and in other knowledge-transfer contexts. It is acknowledged that traditional dissemination mechanisms — such as workshops and publications — are only partially successful. It is therefore important to explore new, and more effective, ways to represent practice between practitioners in different contexts.
In this talk I will discuss two projects that aim to support transfer of practice in different ways. The HCI Disciplinary Commons has been running throughout the 2008-09 academic year and brings together practitioners from across the UK who are teaching human-computer interaction in order to reflect in depth on their teaching practice. The Commons has been using the Portfolio as its primary representation mechanism although other representations have been explored. The Pattern Language Network is a JISC-funded initiative, which aims to support the sharing of practice on the use of Web 2.0 in learning through the harvesting and use of patterns. The talk will introduce the rationale and approach of each project and will discuss the representations explored and what they can contribute to enhancing transfer of practice.
20 November
Steve Whittaker: The Past Present and Future of Digital
Memories
Recent technical developments have inspired an interest in 'digital memories': repositories for capturing our entire personal history of personal and work related information that will substitute for our fragile organic memories. I will first review the Digital Memories vision, briefly present various empirical studies that challenge that vision, moving on to suggest an alternative design approach to the topic that is informed by cognitive science, suggesting that instead of focusing on exhaustive capture we should be designing prosthetic memory devices that are (a) synergistic with our organic memories (b) have mechanisms for selecting and abstracting critical events from the memory record. I will illustrate the approach with reference to applications built within my research group.
Speaker: Steve Whittaker, Sheffield University
Steve Whittaker is Chair in Information Studies at Sheffield University. Previously he worked in industrial research at HP, Lotus/IBM and AT Bell Labs. His research interests are in the theory, design and evaluation of collaborative systems, multimedia retrieval, and personal information management. He was recently elected to the CHI Academy and is currently working on digital tools that help us remember and share our memories.
4 DecemberPostponed
Ian McClelland: User Experience design - reflections on industrial practice
Ian will briefly outline his background and his involvement in the development of interactive systems within Philips. As a main focus the talk will reflect on the shift from product usability to User Experience and the relationship of 'User Experience Design' (UXD) to business development. An initial framework for UXD that he is co-developing with (ex) Philips colleagues will also be discussed. Ian will also briefly outline his interest in working with CUHTec.
11 December
Daniel Kudenko: Interactive Drama
Interactive Drama research is concerned with the creation of virtual worlds where a player can experience and interact with non-player characters in a computer-generated story. The seminar presentation will be in three parts: (1) a brief history of story-telling within commercial computer games, (2) an overview of interactive drama research at York, and (3) a vision of where we plan to go from here.
18 December
Helen Petrie: Internationalization of websites: navigation in
English language and Chinese language sites
Helen Petrie, Christopher Power and Wei Song
Within 20 years of its invention, the World Wide Web has become one of the dominant means of communication of information, commerce, education and entertainment throughout the world. Although the Web is accessible from virtually anywhere in the world, the content of the Web is still predominantly in English.
However, this is beginning to change with the number of websites in Chinese increasing by 950% between 2006 and 2008. Therefore, creating websites for non-English readers is becoming an increasingly important topic. A number of authors (Aykin, Quaet-Faslem and Milewski, 2006; Marcus and Gould, 2000) have developed guidelines and principles for the internationalization of websites. These authors mention the need to align text and graphics appropriately for languages that are written and read from right to left or vertically, but little is said about the effects of different writing arrangements on navigational styles in websites.
Yet the placement of navigational elements in web pages is clearly vital for their effective and efficient use. Experimental studies have shown that native English readers perform best when information for problems is presented in a series of horizontal lines from top left of a page, but readers of languages not traditionally organized this way (e.g. Arabic, Japanese) perform better when information is presented vertically. This leads us to hypothesise that the now “default” arrangement of navigation bars may not be optimal for speakers of languages which differ from the left-to-right/horizontal arrangement of English (and other European languages). Two studies conducted to investigate this hypothesis will be presented.
Spring Term 2009
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 22 January | ||
| 29 January | Ian McClelland University of York |
User Experience design - reflections on industrial practice
Slides (PDF) |
| 5 February | Helen Petrie | Measuring users' emotional reactions to websites |
| 12 February | Andrew Monk | Futurology: predicting trends in assistive technology (AT) and service development |
| 19 February | ||
| 26 February | Mark Blythe | Critical Methods and User Generated Content: the iPhone on YouTube |
| 5 March | ||
| 12 March | Paul Cairns | YouTube by numbers |
| 19 March | Bernd Ploderer University of Melbourne |
Social Network Sites and the Passion of Bodybuilding |
Abstracts
29 January
Ian McClelland: User Experience design - reflections on industrial practice
Ian will briefly outline his background and his involvement in the development of interactive systems within Philips. As a main focus the talk will reflect on the shift from product usability to User Experience and the relationship of 'User Experience Design' (UXD) to business development. An initial framework for UXD that he is co-developing with (ex) Philips colleagues will also be discussed. Ian will also briefly outline his interest in working with CUHTec.
Ian's slides (PDF) are available.
5th February
Helen Petrie & Chandra Harrison: Measuring users' emotional reactions to websites
There is currently considerable interest in the concept of "user experience" (UX), but how to define and measure this concept is still in a state of flux. Different definitions will be discussed, including the centrality of emotion in the concept. Therefore to create a measure of the emotional component of UX, an Emotional Word Prompt List (EWPL) was developed and then used in a retrospective verbal protocol evaluation of websites. Slightly less than half the words on the original EWPL were used frequently in the verbal protocols of their feelings produced by participants. However a list of 16 emotion words emerged from this study that will constitute a revised EWPL to be validated in a future study.
12th February
Andrew Monk: Futurology: predicting trends in assistive technology (AT) and service development
This talk will consider expected changes in older people's experience and expectations along with changes in the provision of consumer electronics in order to suggest future models for AT provision. It will be argued that the important problems that older people have with new technologies are cohort effects, that is due their experiences when younger rather than functional decline. It will also argue that the new service based model embraced by many manufacturers of consumer electronics will lead to new expectations in the future cohorts of the older old. Finally, it will be argued that current Telecare and AT initiatives in the UK put us ahead of the game in catering for these new service users
12th March
Bernd Ploderer: Social Network Sites and the Passion of Bodybuilding
In this talk I will discuss the ways in which people appropriate social network sites to pursue their passions. This research is based on a current ethnographic study of bodybuilding, which serves as an example for an extreme passion. I will describe the stages underlying this passion, starting with the development of the passion to stages where passion can turn into obsession. I will then discuss the role that social network sites play for the various stages and address the risks and limitations of existing social network sites.
Since this study is work-in-progress I would welcome suggestions on the analysis and presentation of the data as well as on opportunities for comparing the findings from bodybuilding with other passions.
Bernd Ploderer is a visiting student at Sheffield Hallam University from January to April 2009, hosted by Peter Wright. He works on his PhD in the Interaction Design Group at the University of Melbourne, supervised by Steve Howard and Peter Thomas.
Summer Term 2009
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 30 April | ||
| 7 May | ||
| 14 May | Hyesook Kim | Informing design with emotional probes |
| 21 May | ||
| 28 May | Paul Cairns | Some new results on immersion |
| 4 June | Alistair Edwards | Relatively PC DVD |
| 11 June | Alistair Edwards | New approaches in access to mathematics for blind students |
| 18 June | Greg Hale | Towards a new psychology of entertainment, using schema theory to study film |
| 25 June | Sofia Abd Malik | Use of mobile phones by older people in Malaysia and the UK |
Abstracts
14 May
Hyesook Kim: Informing design with emotional probes
This talk will describe a method to inform the design of communication technologies that allow people with family members living abroad to feel appropriate emotions when communicating. Five participants in the UK and three in South Korea were recruited. They were all members of three-generational families, where at least one person is geographically separated from the others. Two interviews were conducted. In the first, they were asked about the members of their family and how they communicate. A box of 'things to do' was left with them. These emotional prompts included: Spirit of the Oracle cards with an invitation to write about the feeling they elicit with regard to their family; a digital camera with instructions, e.g., to photograph 'something you would like to share'; a contact diary to note times when communication was pleasant or unpleasant; a sheet on which to describe 'a family journey where I was very happy'. The second interview, a few days after the first, focussed on their responses to the probes. Both interviews were recorded and transcribed. They are now being coded using grounded theory analysis. Themes emerging include: reassurance with regard to intergenerational obligations; comfort and consolation from yearning, and establishing and maintaining identity.
28 May
Paul Cairns: Some new results on immersion
My third year undergraduates have been doing various projects for me in relation to immersion in videogames. In this talk, I would like to present some of their findings and how they fill out my current understanding of immersion. Specifically, they have looked at immersion in relation to presence, social gaming and a comparison with immersion in programming.
4 June
DVD: Relatively PC
This is the latest episode in the soap opera that is a series of plays produced by Dundee University about people's experience with technology - and particularly that of older people. In this episode one of the characters buys a PC - and then is not sure what to do with it, while others struggle with getting theirs to do what they want them to, for shopping, email and banking.
This play was produced as part of the EPSRC-sponsored cluster on Digital Inclusion which included members from York. At this showing there will be an opportunity for discussion - including insights from members as to how the DVD was produced.
11 June
Alistair Edwards: New approaches in teaching mathematics to
blind students
Slides: PowerPoint, PDF
I have been involved in two European projects which had very similar objectives - of making mathematics more accessible to upper-secondary-school students. I will give a brief overview of these projects, of the similarities and differences between their approaches. I will also summarize some of the lessons learned.
One obvious observation is that the vast majority of blind students never reach that level of mathematical education. If we are to address this, then we will have to find ways of teaching basic mathematics to younger pupils. I will present some ideas as to how we might do that - in ways that might also make mathematics more interesting for sighted students.
18 June
Greg Hale:
Towards a new psychology of entertainment, using schema theory to study film
This research used two short films to investigate whether schema theory has value for researching and designing entertainment experiences.
The first study used the neutrally rated Ice Cream Dream to qualitatively analyze talk from ten viewers, for research and design contributions based on schema theory. The analysis was systematic and driven by the data, with bottom up analysis iteratively structured by emergent schematic categories. The viewer’s talk indicated confusion about the film content and included talk on schematic structure in the film. The second study developed a method of schematic analysis to investigate schemas in a case study in good structure, The Wrong Trousers. The film’s content was systematically logged, with ‘behavioural schemas’ and ‘re-interpretive schemas’ emerging as new schemas that structure the film. All the schemas were causally linked with each other. The third study used schematic analysis to investigate Ice Cream Dream, both as a comparison to The Wrong Trousers and for research and design contributions from schema theory. Behavioural schemas were only partially evident, with content weakly linked causally or unlinked. The fourth study examined if non-interview based viewer’s talk would contribute additional insights and design implications from schema theory, using 65 online movie reviews of The Wrong Trousers. Systematic analysis revealed strong positive reactions focused on behavioural schemas plus two high salience elements (the techno trousers and the penguin).
This research has revealed that schema theory is powerful in identifying research based insights into film content, including the identification of two new structuring schemas. 23 final design implications resulted from the four studies, revealing that schema theory is also powerful in design terms. Further research will include schema based studies into other films, the development of a systematic Schematic Analysis Design Method (SADM) and the development of a descriptive modeling language for entertainment experiences.
25 June
Sofia Abd Malik:
Use of mobile phones by older people in Malaysia and the UK
I will like to present the findings from two studies that were conducted in Malaysia and UK. The studies were about the current use of mobile phones by older people, focusing on talking methods that include interview and focus group. In addition, the use of personas was explored in the context of using it as a tool.
Autumn Term 2009
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 22 October | Andrew Monk (with Patrick Olivier, University of Newcastle) |
Ambient Kitchen: designing situated services using a high fidelity prototyping environment |
| 29 October in Langwith L/037 |
Alastair Gill, University of Surrey |
Social Information in Computer-Mediated Communication |
| 5 November | Alistair Edwards | (Almost) random thoughts on randomness |
| 12 November | Siân Lindley, Microsoft Research, Cambridge | From playfulness to intensity: Expressing value through communication technologies |
| 2pm Wednesday 18 November |
Thomas Green, Visiting Professor, University of York |
Information Structures, Notations, and Cognitive
Psychology Department of Computer Science Seminar (CS103) |
| 19 November | No Seminar | |
| 26 November | Helen Petrie | Measuring emotion in human-computer interaction |
| 3 December | Peter Kennaugh | Identifying User Experience with Folk Usability Evaluations |
| 10 December* | John Robinson | Computational Photography II: Beautiful Portraits |
| 17 December | Paul Cairns | Symmetry and affordance |
Abstracts
22 October
Andrew Monk, Department of psychology and Patrick Olivier: Ambient Kitchen: designing situated services using a high
fidelity prototyping environment
The Ambient Kitchen is a high fidelity prototype for exploring the design of pervasive computing algorithms and applications for everyday environments. The environment integrates data projectors, cameras, RFID tags and readers, object mounted accelerometers, and under-floor pressure sensing using a combination of wired and wireless networks. The Ambient Kitchen is a lab-based replication of a real kitchen where careful design has hidden the additional technology, and allows both the evaluation of pervasive computing prototypes and the simultaneous capture of the multiple synchronized streams of sensor data. Previous work exploring the requirements for situated support for people with cognitive impairments motivated the design of the physical and technical infrastructure and we describe both our motivations and previous work on interaction design in kitchen environments. Finally, we describe how our lab-based prototype has been put to use as: a design tool for designers; a design tool for users; an observatory to collect sensor data for activity recognition algorithm development, and an evaluation test bed. The limitations and advantages of lab-based, as opposed to in situ home-based testing, are discussed.
29 October
Alastair Gill: Social Information in Computer-Mediated Communication
Online media increasingly enable us to develop and support social relationships. Although never easier to exchange richer forms of media, communication generally remains text-based. My research focuses on the communication of social information fundamental to understanding others in text.
In particular, my work shows that qualities such as personality, emotion and trust are characterised linguistically in a text-based environment (email, blogs, IM), and generally personality and emotion can be accurately perceived from short snippets of text. There are, however, some interesting wrinkles present in the results: For example, it is more important to consider which personality trait or emotion is being considered, than talking about general accuracies. Similarly, although I have found increased linguistic similarity relates to trust in dialogue, automatically generated dialogues including greater similarity were perceived negatively.
I will discuss some of the issues raised by this research, and conclude the talk by discussing the role of social information in computer-supported collaboration.
Alastair Gill is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Research in Social Simulation, University of Surrey, working with Nigel Gilbert. His research focuses on social aspects of computer-mediated communication and the related areas of human-computer interaction, computer-supported cooperative work, computational linguistics and cognitive science. He has previously held positions at the Center for Technology and Social Behavior, Northwestern University, and LEAD-CNRS, University of Burgundy, France. Alastair received his Ph.D. in Informatics from the University of Edinburgh in 2004 (supervised by Jon Oberlander), which he took following the M.Sc. program in Cognitive Science and Natural Language. His B.A. was in English Language and Literature.
5 November
Alistair Edwards: (Almost) Random thoughts on randomness
It seems that randomness may be an essential part of everyday life and of interactions between people. Might it not be, therefore, that a degree of randomness in interactions between people and computers might in fact be beneficial?
Yet, what is randomness? Computers are deterministic and therefore incapable of exhibiting truly random behaviour. At the same time people's perceptions of what is random are biased.
On the other hand, if a process is complex and therefore impossible to (accurately) model, is it any different from being random?
And where does chaos fit in?
These and other questions will be posed.
12 November
Siân Lindley, Microsoft Research, Cambridge: From playfulness to intensity: Expressing value through
communication technologies
At the heart of user-centred design lies an understanding of what the user would need, be this technology that is easy to use, that links them to others, or that facilitates a particular type of experience. In this talk, I will consider how different types of experience might arise from, and be sought for through, the use of technologies that support expression and communication. In particular, I will report on a field trial of Wayve, a household messaging device that was found to evoke playfulness and creativity, and on a project with older adults, which led to an understanding of their approach to contact as being based on a need for focus and intensity.
Wednesday 18 November
(Computer Science Departmental Seminar, CS103)
Information Structures, Notations, and Cognitive Psychology
There has been plenty of talk about ‘information overload’, how sources of information can be combined, how social networking can create fast dissemination, and so on. To this potent mix I wish to add consideration of information structures: how information is stored and presented and communicated. We need to think about notations, the structures we use for communicating information, and what for lack of a better vocabulary I shall call ‘information artefacts,’ the documents and devices in which we store and manipulate information. My concern is not computational efficiency but psychological usability.
I shall touch lightly on (1) how notational structures appear to affect the way in which people create and study information artefacts (spreadsheets versus OO ... when to invest attention ... why graphical notations are no panacea ....).; (2) how notational choices relate to communication and organisational roles (spreadsheets again ... ); (3) ecosystems of notations (coupled and collaborating notations); and (4) notations over time -- how notational space gets harmfully consumed, and how the laws of informational economics seem to prevent future-proofing notations. More questions than answers, of course.
Examples likely to range from Hampton Court maze to speech-driven programming and from LabView to metadata, some bizarre features of standard music notation, and maybe why paper is the opposite of juggling.
26 November
Helen Petrie: Measuring emotion in human-computer interaction
3 December Peter Kennaugh: Identifying User Experience with Folk Usability Evaluations
More and more people are now publishing their own content on the Internet in the form of blogs, reviews and videos. It should be expected that because of the origin of this user-generated content, it contains some amount of user experience information. Therefore its use to evaluate a device should give different results to the more traditional evaluation methods currently used in industry.
I shall be proposing a new evaluation method which uses specific types of this user-generated content to evaluate a specific device (the iPhone 3G), which we have named 'Folk Usability' evaluation. Results of using this method have been compared with two alternative forms of evaluation - 'professional' evaluation methods (e.g. Heuristic evaluation) and media reportings of evaluations, with noticable differences identified between the three. These differences shall be presented, with an argument that a technique similar to 'Folk Usability' evaluation may already be used in industry given to conclude.
10 December
John Robinson: Computational Photography II: Beautiful Portraits
Nearly two years ago I presented an HCI seminar on Computational Photography. This seminar is an update. We have been working on face image description and a recent turn has been the estimation of attractiveness or beauty in portraits. I will outline the computational mechanism but focus on results, including the performance of a beauty estimator applied to paintings from the National Portrait Gallery, and examples of the beautification or uglification of small portraits. The embodiment of our methods in iPhone apps raises some HCI questions.
*Andrew Howes
Please note that Andrew has decided to give his talk on Understanding Users of Computer Systems as Bounded-Optimal Agents as part of the Psychology Department series, on Tuesday, 17 November.
Abstract
Arguably, any science and/or engineering discipline should benefit from theory that offers both relevance and predictive adequacy. The talk will describe recent developments in understanding human-machine interaction that start from the assumption that people are boundedly optimal agents. Bounded optimality, Russell and Subramanian (1995), was proposed a number of years ago as a framing assumption for Artificial Intelligence and recent demonstrations (Howes, Lewis, Vera, in press) suggest that it is a promising basis for understanding human behavior as well.
Russell, S. & Subramanian, D. (1995). Provably bounded-optimal agents. Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, 2, 575--609.
http://personalpages.manchester.ac.uk/staff/howesa
Archive - previous seminars
Spring Term
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 21 February | Alistair Edwards | Access to museums and galleries for visually impaired people |
| 28 February | Richard Ribeiro Department of Computer Science |
Identifying 'Hidden' Communities of Practice Within Electronic Networks: Some Preliminary Premises |
| 6 March | Chandra Harrison | Morae from TechSmith - Not nearly as slippery as the eel |
| 13 March | Eduardo Calvillo UCLIC, London |
Assessing the Gaming Experience |
Abstracts
21 February
Alistair Edwards: Access to museums and galleries for visually impaired people
There is an increasing awareness of the need for access to public places for disabled people. However, often this awareness is confined to the question of physical access, other needs, and particularly those of visitors with visual impairments, are often not addressed. I will present some approaches to achieving access which is more equal, using: tactile images, sound guides and combinations of these. We will explore their weaknesses as well as their strengths and where there are research opportunities to improve on them.
28 February
Richard Ribeiro: Identifying 'Hidden' Communities of Practice Within Electronic
Networks: Some Preliminary Premises
The talk will discuss the possibility of discovering "hidden" (potential) Communities of Practice (CoPs) inside electronic networks, and how to use this knowledge to nurture them into a fully developed Virtual Community of Practice (VCoP). It will be discuss questions connected to this: the relation between CoPs, Virtual Communities (VCs), Distributed Communities of Practice (DCoPs) and Virtual Communities of Practice (VCoPs); the characteristics of "hidden" communities; the methods to search for "hidden" CoPs; how to clearly define a fully developed VCoP; and how to change "hidden" CoPs into fully developed VCoPs.
6 March
Chandra Harrison: Morae from TechSmith - Not nearly as slippery as the eel
Morae is video capture and analysis software for usability testing and user experience research that helps identify site and application design problems and share them with stakeholders. It is one of the leading analysis tools for usability testing and offers recording, remote viewing, video coding, data analysis, video clip facilities and survey functions. The HCI Group currently holds licence for the software and it has been used for several studies undertaken in the last few years.
The complexity of the programme makes it a useful tool for a variety of situations, but also requires a reasonable amount of experience to operate well. While Chandra does not profess to being an expert Morae user, in the course of her PhD research she has had numerous hours experience with the programme and would like to share her knowledge in lieu of a real seminar. The seminar will involve explanation of Morae and a demonstration of some of the main functions. Those of you already familiar with Morae may also want to contribute your experience during the seminar.
13 March
Eduardo Calvillo-Gamez: Assessing the Gaming Experience
In this talk I will present an overview of my PhD work. The research question driving my research is: how can we assess user experience? The grounding to find the answer is on Critical Rationalism. The focus of the research is on videogames, and in particular on the user experience of playing videogames, or gaming experience. In this talk I will discuss the approach to user experience used in the research, as well as the results obtained while studying the gaming experience. The results suggest that it is indeed possible to study user experience under falsifiability.
Spring Term 2010
All seminars are on Thursdays 1315-1415 in Computer Science CS103 - unless otherwise stated.
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 14 January CS/202J |
Thomas Visser, TU Delft |
The design and evaluation of awareness systems |
| 21 January CS/202J |
Shamus Smith, Durham University |
Computer game experience bias in user evaluations |
| 28 January | Daniel Gooch Bath University |
Communicating a Sense of Presence using Thermal Stimuli |
| 4 February | Lucy Buykx University of York |
CHE - Improving heuristic evaluation through collaborative working |
| 11 February | Alistair Edwards University of York |
Randomness: Part 31 in a series of 2 |
| 18 February | Sofia Abd Malik University of York |
Investigation of cultural dependency in mobile technology and older people |
| 25 February | Patrick Olivier University of Newcastle |
Multi-Touch Authentication on Tabletops |
| 4 March | Andrew Lamb DirectGov |
Title to be announced Postponed |
| 11 March | Hyesook Kim University of York |
Design of technology to connect 3-generation families at a distance |
| 24 March CS/101 |
Richard Ribeiro University of York |
Searching for unseen communities of practice |
Abstracts
14 January
Thomas Visser: The design and evaluation of awareness systems
Social awareness products and systems can increase people's feelings of being connected to their social network. Following a research through design process, I design awareness system prototypes to investigate how particular aspects of the systems contribute to this social connectedness. In parallel I am working on a methodology for evaluating the prototype systems in a real user context.
21 January
Shamus Smith: Computer game experience bias in
user evaluations
In the development of user interfaces, user-centric evaluations are commonly performed. Anecdotal evidence suggests that factors such as prior experience with computer games may affect the results of such evaluations. This is of particular concern in the evaluation of virtual environments, which have many commonalities with modern 3D-based computer games. Computer game technology is also increasingly reused for research and industrial applications and this has implications on any related evaluations of such systems.
This talk will address gamer bias in (1) the context of the evaluation of a fire drill simulator and (2) the effects of previous computer gaming experience, user perceived gaming ability and actual gaming performance on navigation tasks in virtual environments.
28 January
Daniel Gooch: Communicating a Sense of Presence using Thermal Stimuli
Social Presence is the concept of 'being there', of emotional connectedness to another individual. As relationships are increasingly formed by spatially disparate partners, supporting social presence has become more important. However it remains a poorly understood concept. This presentation looks into the various factors that could impact social presence, before discussing the specific findings of an investigation involving thermal stimuli and social presence. The talk concludes with a discussion of various avenues of further investigation.
4 February
Lucy Buykx: CHE - Improving heuristic evaluation through collaborative
working
Heuristic evaluation is a methodology popular with usability
professionals. It identifies potential usability problems with
interfaces before the need to commit large amounts of time and
money with user testing. However the success has been
challenged; high numbers of problems of a trivial nature are
found and there is low agreement between problems found by
different people evaluating the same interface. This study
compared results from a standard heuristic evaluation with that
from a variation where evaluators worked together to find
usability problems. Results of the collaborative method showed a
significantly higher agreement between the evaluators which
indicates a higher reliability of problems found.
The study was performed as my masters project last summer. Helen
Petrie wrote up a paper of the study which has been accepted for
the UPA 2010 conference (Usability Professionals Association).
In the talk I will cover the background, experiment design and
results, and include some of the challenges found in analysing a
large body of qualitative data to come up with some quantitative
results!
11 February
Alistair Edwards: Randomness: Part 31 in a series of 2
In a previous seminar, I questioned the nature of randomness, its role in human behaviour and whether it is a necessary element of natural interaction. I proposed that the the universe was necessarily deterministic, but the suggestion was raised that the universe is in fact random, and we impose order (causal determinism) on it. In this seminar I will explore the latter approach.
I will extend the concept into one form of on-line interaction: gambling. Gamblers rely on the randomness of the software they use, but where does this faith come from and is it well-placed?
There will be sweets for the lucky winners in this seminar.
18 February
Sofia Abd Malik: Investigation of cultural dependency in mobile technology and older people
This is part of the PhD work that has been accepted in CHI 2010 under work in progress category. It covers about the studies using different methods that have been carried out of older adults' use of mobile technology in Malaysia and the UK. Preliminary results suggest that there are significant differences in the results which are culturallly dependent.
25 February
Patrick Olivier: Multi-Touch Authentication on Tabletops
The introduction of tabletop interfaces brings a pressing need for the development of secure and usable authentication techniques that are appropriate for the co-located collaborative settings for which they have been designed. Most commonly, user authentication is based on "something you know", but this is a particular problem for tabletop interfaces, as they are particularly vulnerable to shoulder surfing given their remit to foster co-located collaboration. In other words, tabletop users typically authenticate in full view of a number of observers. In this talk, I will introduce and discuss the evaluation a number of novel tabletop authentication schemes that exploit the features of multi-touch interaction in order to inhibit shoulder surfing. In our pilot work with users, and in our formal user-evaluation, one authentication scheme - PressureGrid - stood out, significantly enhancing authentication security when participants used it to enter PINs and Passfaces graphical passwords. I will also talk generally about tabletop technology and interaction research at Newcastle, and future directions.
11 March
Hyesook Kim:
Design of technology to connect 3-generation families at a distance
This seminar will explain some of the results of a probe study where members of three-generational families, where at least one person is geographically separated from the others, talk about their emotional experiences. The method for eliciting this information is briefly described along with some of the themes identified in a grounded theory analysis. These include: sharing the moment with pride; reassurance with regard to intergenerational obligations; comfort and consolation from yearning; and little time to give comfort to one another.
Abstracts for postponed seminars
26 November
Sawit Kasuriya: Pilot experiments on children's voice recording
Automatic speech recognition is being used increasingly in a variety of applications. There is great potential for its use in educational applications for children. However, the accuracy of recognition of child speech is very low. There are probably a number of reasons for this, but one is the difficulty in collecting high-quality recordings of children to be used in the building of speech models. If a better interface can be provided between the child and the recording equipment then it may be possible to collect better samples. Interfaces have been designed to be tested to that end, using alternative interface paradigms: push-to-talk and a limited time recording with and without a progress bar. These alternatives will be compared by collecting speech samples and measuring their quality.
Summer Term 2010
All in CS103 - unless otherwise noted.
| Date | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|
| 29 April | No one | No seminar |
| 6 May CS103 |
Will Miles University of York |
Gestures and maths(Postponed) |
| 13 May ATB/035 |
Andrew Monk University of York |
The inference of perceived usability from beauty |
| 20 May | No one | No seminar |
| 21 May 14.15 CS/202J |
Will Miles University of York |
Gestures and maths |
| 27 May | Janet Read University of Central Lancashire |
Hey you - who R U callin' a designer? |
| 3 June | Alistair Edwards University of York |
Sonification strategies for examination of biological cells |
| Monday 7 June |
Matthew Hudson University of York |
Semiotics and games |
| 10 June | Chris Power University of York |
Accessible culture: reaching broader audiences through personalization (Postponed) |
| 17 June | Lucy Buykx University of York |
Challenging assumptions : Older people's attitudes to technology and cooking (work in progress) |
| 24 June | Helen Petrie | Recent usability and user experience work for DirectGov |
| 12 July | Sofia Abd Malik | Cultural differences in use of mobile phones by older people |
13 May
Andrew Monk: The inference of perceived usability from beauty
I will present some data that re-examine the relation between beauty and usability, that is, the implication that 'what is beautiful is usable'. In order to rectify previous methodological shortcomings, both products and participants were sampled in the same way and the data aggregated both by averaging over participants to assess the covariance across ratings of products and by averaging over products to assess the covariance across participants. In addition, we adopted an inference perspective to qualify underlying processes to examine the possibility that, under the circumstances pertaining in most studies of this kind where participants have limited experience of using a website or product, the relationship between beauty and usability is mediated by goodness.
21 May
Will Miles: Gestures and maths
In this literature review seminar I will be looking at the research that has been done on how maths is taught in primary schools, specifically how multiplication tables are learnt. I then will show the different types of computer interface using gestures and then bring these two subjects together by looking at how the use of gesture can improve learning.
27 May
Janet Read: Hey you - who R U callin' a designer?
In this informative and lively talk, Dr Janet Read, a Reader in Child Computer Interaction at the University of Central Lancashire will explode the myth of children as designers. This myth, promoted in the last decade of the last century, arose from the belief that the participatory design approach, initially promoted for all sorts of social and political reasons, was necessarily valuable and adaptable to child centred design.
Beginning with a look at the history of the PD method, this talk will draw on examples from the research carried out at the Child Computer Interaction Group in UCLan and will demonstrate several holes in the suggestion that children need to be involved in the designs of their own products. The talk will leave attendees asking some political and social questions about participatory practises and they will take a way some amusing, but relevant, stories about design studies with children.
3 June
Alistair Edwards: Sonification strategies for examination of biological cells
Cervical cancer is one of the most preventable forms of the disease thanks to the fact that pre-cancerous changes can be detected in cervical cells. These cells are examined visually under microscopes, but the objective of this project was to ascertain whether their examination could be improved if the visual inspection were accompanied by an auditory representation. A number of different sound mappings were tested. This paper also traces the way the sound experiments evolved in parallel with the underlying research on cell image analysis. The main conclusion is that in this kind of application, the important parameters to sonify are the ‘badness’ of the cell and the reliability of that rating, and some likely sound mappings to convey this information have been identified.
This will be a practice for a talk to be presented at ICAD 2010. Co-authors of the accompanying paper are: Andy Hunt, Geneviève Hines, Vanessa Jackson, Alyte Podvoiskis, Richard Roseblade and Jon Stammers.
10 June
Chris Power: Accessible culture: reaching broader audiences
through personalization
(Abstract to follow)
17 June
Lucy Buykx:Challenging assumptions : Older people's attitudes to technology and cooking (work in progress)
Older people may find it difficult to shop, cook and eat healthy meals because of minor disabilities, reduced income and many have lost spouses meaning they now have to cook only for one. Engineering technology may help overcome diminished physical abilities, Interactive technologies may help provide relevant timely support and inspiration and enable better coping strategies, but may present difficulties for people with visual or motor impairments or who are unfamiliar with interactive technology. A series of focus groups explored the cooking and eating habits of older people and what they find useful and useless in the kitchen. Some common assumptions were held up, for example many participants found assistive devices such as jar openers useful. However the difficulties faced by growing older were not considered an impediment to good healthy cooking, rather a challenge above which experience could easily triumph.
23 June
Helen Petrie: Recent usability and user experience work for DirectGov
The HCI Group was recently commissioned by DirectGov to investigate methodologies for identifying government websites with severe problems that ought not go forward with the new government branding. We conducted a literature review of existing expert and user based methods for them and then conducted an empirical investigation, using six government websites. This presentation will give an initial overview of both aspects of the work.
12 July
Sofia Abd Malik: Cultural differences in use of mobile phones by older people
In the thesis seminar, I will present the results about studies using different methods that have been conducted in two countries (Malaysia and United Kingdom) focusing on the use of mobile technology and older people.
Autumn Term 2010
All seminars are on Thursdays, 1315-1415, but please note that they are not all in the same room.
| Date | Room | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 21 October | CSE/082 | Chris Power | Accessible culture: reaching broader audiences through technology |
| 28 October | CSE/082 | Alistair Edwards | Who is old? |
| 4 November | CSE/102 | Chris Power | Models of Accessibility in Higher and Further Education |
| 11 November | CSE/102 | Helen Petrie & Sara Waszkiewicz | Users' mental models of their Facebook privacy settings |
| 18 November | CSE/102 | Alistair Edwards | Future-proofing heritage |
| 25 November | CSE/102 | Rebecca Randell University of Leeds |
Understanding work practice within diagnostic pathology: Implications for design |
| 2 December | CSE/102 | Hyesook Kim | Postponed Field study of the TimelyPresent: Allowing family members to feel more connected |
| 9 December | CSE/102 | ||
| 16 December | TFTV | John Mateer | Guided tour of Theatre, Film and Television |
21 October
Chris Power: Accessible culture:
reaching broader audiences through technology
Cultural centres such as museums, libraries and music halls are all moving online and incorporating technology into their exhibits. With the wide variety of audiences coming to these centres to experience culture in different ways, how can we ensure that everyone receives a meaningful experience?
This talk will look at the history of accessibility from its beginnings on the web with the infamous Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) and discuss the (little) impact these guidelines have had in making websites accessible and in raising awareness. It will follow with a discussion of the new WCAG 2.0 and examine what it means for people employing technology in domains beyond the web
Finally, it will look at the future of technology and how we need to change the way we think about accessibility as a broader cultural community interacting with audiences.
The proposition is that we need to focus on the content being delivered, not the technology, and think about what is the meaning that we want to communicate to our audiences.
This talk was given as a keynote by Chris and Helen at the Museum Computer Group Conference in the winter of 2009 and repeated by Chris as a keynote at the Physical Digital conference in the spring of 2010.
28 October
Alistair Edwards: Who is old?
Much HCI research is aimed at 'older' users - but who are they? Age is a deceptive characteristic. It seems easy to define - in terms of the number of years a person has lived, but in practice it is a multi-dimensional property. We need to get a handle on those different dimensions if we are to try to work with these people as a group.
In this seminar I will explore determinants of age, particularly across different cultures.
As usual, I expect to raise more question than answers.
4 November
Chris Power: Models of Accessibility in Higher and Further Education
Continuing the (now) series of talks on different perspectives on accessibility, Chris will present the work that has been done by our HCI Research Group working in the European Approach for Accessibility Lifelong Learning (EU4ALL) project. York is responsible for the requirements gathering and evaluation of interactive systems produced by the project.
In this talk, Chris will present the requirements gathering activities that went on in the project, and how the data was analyzed. This analysis informed the creation of a conceptual model about accessibility in higher and further education, specifically driving from the preparation of content through to delivery in the classroom or online. This conceptual model has been realized in system models that can be used for personalization of educational resources and services for people with disabilities.
11 November
Helen Petrie & Sara Waszkiewicz: Users' mental models of their
Facebook privacy settings
Facebook is the leading social network site (SNS), which continues to thrive in spite of a number of recent controversies. One of these controversies concerned changes to users’ privacy settings and consequently user information available to different groups on Facebook. These changes started in December 2009, continuing until May 2010 and are possibly ongoing. This proved a very interesting and relevant backdrop to what started as a general study of whether users understand the privacy implications of SNSs and turned into a specific investigation of whether users understand the specific changes that Facebook has made to its privacy settings in the past year. This study conducted in depth interviews with 24 Facebook users. The interviews also included a number of different activities to elicit people’s mental models of privacy settings on Facebook. These talk explores some of the results of this study.
18 November
Alistair Edwards: Future-proofing heritage
This talk will have almost nothing to do with human-computer interaction but I will be giving it because:
- It should be of interest to other members of the group who are working on heritage-related projects.
- I need to practise the talk before I give it at the Royal Anthropological Institution.
- It fills a gap in the seminar programme.
Royal Anthropological Institution is a small but important organization which has a priceless collection of documents and photographs. It recently started to digitize some of its collections on a very modest scale. By way of a student project undertaken by Yu Lin, we have been advising them on technology and particularly on how they might avoid obsolescence of their digitized artefacts.
There are a number of interesting aspects to this project, including:
- The RAI personnel expected to do most of the work are not technology experts.
- The RAI is a poor organization.
- Access to the digital artefacts must be controlled, partly for copyright reasons but also because many of them are culturally senstitive.
25 November
Rebecca Randell: Understanding work practice within diagnostic pathology: Implications for design
Histopathologists diagnose cancer and other diseases by using a microscope to examine glass slides containing thin sections of human tissue. Technological advances mean that it is now possible to completely digitise such slides so that they can be viewed on a computer screen. This is a technology that has the potential to revolutionise work practice within diagnostic pathology, with promised improvements in safety and efficiency. Despite this, uptake of the technology is slow and previous studies report scepticism and uncertainty amongst potential users. As part of a project to develop a digital microscope, we conducted naturalistic observations that explicate the detail of how histopathologists accomplish their work, in order to produce an account of work practices in diagnostic pathology. Observations were combined with semi-structured interviews, to capture histopathologists’ perspectives on their work and their attitudes toward digital microscopy. I will present the findings of our studies and consider the implications of this for the design of a digital microscope.
9 December
Hyesook Kim:
Field study of the TimelyPresent: Allowing family members to feel more connected
16 December
John Mateer: Guided tour of Theatre, Film and Television
The Department of Theatre, Film and Television (TFTV) has recently moved into a new building with extensive facilities. This will be the opportunity for members of the HCI Group to tour these facilities with expert guidance from John Mateer.
Details of when and where to meet will be published nearer the time.
Spring Term 2011
All seminars are on Thursdays, 1315-1415, but please note that they are not all in the same room.
| Date | Room | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20 January | CSE/083 | Cancelled | |
| 27 January | CSE/083 | Alistair Edwards | How to get you paper accepted for Chi |
| 3 February | CSE/083 | Hyesook Kim | Field study of the TimelyPresent: Allowing family members to feel more connected |
| 10 February | CSE/083 | Sarah Wiseman | Understanding number entry error |
| 17 February | CSE/083 | Helen Petrie Chris Power |
Explorations in the use of card sorting |
| 24 February | CSE/083 | John Precious | User Experience: Analysis of Research prompted by Hassenzahl & Tractinsky’s Research Agenda Postponed |
| 3 March | CSE/083 | No seminar - Computer Science Staff Meeting | |
| 10 March | CSE/083 | Paul Cairns | The perils of designing questionnaires (Slides - PDF) |
| 17 March | CSE/102-3 | Paul Cairns | Using YouTube to study immersion |
Abstracts
27 January
Alistair Edwards: How to get you paper accepted for Chi
This abstract - and seminar - could be very short:
Write an excellent paper on human-computer interaction
That's a good start, but it may not be enough, or rather, even if it is an excellent paper, there are things you should know so that you can further improve your chances of your paper being accepted. I have acted as an Associate Chair on the Programme Committee for Chi for two years, so I will explain how the review process works, in the hope that you will be able to use that process to your best advantage.
3 February
Hyesook Kim:
Field study of the TimelyPresent: Allowing family members to feel more connected
‘TimelyPresent’ was developed to allow family members who are living apart in different time zones to feel more connected. For the TimelyPresent trial study, four participant families were recruited (grandchildren, their parents and grandparents) where at least one person is geographically separated from the others. Each family was allowed to use two TimelyPresents as a pair, for example, parents with children in the UK and the grandparents in South Korea. Each pair sends and receives a simple video message, ‘a present’ to each other across the two countries. The aim of study is to understand the problems and opportunities provided by participants trying out TimelyPresent and telling us about their experiences using it. Eight participants were interviewed after the first and second months of using TimelyPresent. In each interview, open questions were asked about how they felt about making and receiving presents, changes in the relationship with remote family, and the best and the worst things about TimelyPresent. With 15 interview recorded files in 12 hrs 27 min, 113 pages of transcripts were generated. The method for eliciting this information is briefly described along with some of the themes identified in a grounded theory analysis. Log information was also derived by recording the traffic of use of TimelyPresent. Some behaviours found through analysing it are addressed.
10 February
Sarah Wiseman:
Understanding Number Entry Error
People are prone to errors in many aspects of life, including when entering numbers. The effects of these errors can be disastrous, for example when an incorrect number is entered when programming a medical infusion pump. Designing better systems may help to prevent these errors however, in order to do this we need to understand far more about the types of errors being made, and their causes. Unfortunately, there are very few documented examples of number entry errors and thus many of the studies so far rely upon modelled, not real world data. This seminar will detail a study used to elicit number entry error and the process of coding the results and creating a taxonomy to organise them. The impact this taxonomy will have on future research will also be discussed.
17 February
Helen Petrie & Chris Power: Explorations in the use of card sorting
The card sort technique has many uses in HCI research and practice. Card sorts have traditionally been conducted with physical cards but now online programs are available for this task. It is unclear if results from an online version of this technique as reliable as the “oncard” version. This paper presents a study comparing oncard and online versions of the card sort technique for two website domains. Unexpected results will be revealed! The card sort technique was also able to reveal cultural differences between mental models of British, Chinese and Indian participants.
10 March
Paul Cairns: The perils of designing questionnaires
This talk presents of a critique of a paper that appeared in Interacting with Computers, which aimed to develop a short usability questionnaire. At first sight, it seems to have been developed well with good use of statistical methods and the design of the validation studies. However, closer analysis suggests that the whole approach is deeply flawed and draws into question the value of the questionnaire. I conclude with some more general lessons about questionnaire development in HCI.
Slides (PDF)
17 March
Paul Cairns: Using YouTube to study immersion
YouTube offers an previously unparalleled resource for getting directly at people, their perceptions and self-presentations. I am very interested in the immersive of experience of playing games. In this talk, I will present my first forays into using YouTube for studying gaming immersion with a view to perhaps getting a handle on the effect of social factors that influence immersion. The research style used is one that Mark Blythe and I have been developing which takes a multi-method approach to make the most of the richness of YouTube data.
Please note the change of venue: CSE/102-3
Summer Term 2011
All seminars are on Thursdays, 1315-1415 - except the Departmental seminar on Wednesday 4th May, which starts at 14.00. Also please note that they are not all in the same room.
| Date | Room | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 28 April | CSE/083 | Cancelled | |
| Wednesday 4 May 14.00 |
CSE/083 | Gavin Doherty | Computer Science Departmental Seminar Designing Technology for Mental Health |
| 5 May | (No seminar: CREST Network meeting) | ||
| 12 May | CSE/083 | Alistair Edwards | The Crest Network |
| 19 May | CSE/083 | Chris Power Helen Petrie |
Further adventures in card sorting |
| 26 May | CSE/083 | Chris Power Helen Petrie |
Remote testing of WCAG techniques |
| 2 June | CSE/083 | Helen Petrie | F for Fake: Four Studies on How We Fall for Phish |
| 9 June | CSE/083 | Michael Harrison | Modelling and analysing the interactive behaviour of an infusion pump |
| 16 June | CSE/083 | Anna Bramwell-Dicks | Music as an affective medium |
| 23 June | CSE/102-3 | Helen Petrie | F for Fake - Part 2 |
Abstracts
4 May
Gavin Doherty: Designing Technology for Mental Health
Mental health difficulties are currently the leading cause of disability in developed countries (WHO metrics). While uptake of technology in the area has been slow, a variety of new technologies to support mental health treatment are emerging. Many of these aim to improve access to treatment and to provide more engaging and relevant treatment to clients, and particularly young people. However, technologies which suffer from usability problems or which fail to take into account the real needs of clients and the context in which treatment is provided are unlikely to succeed. In this talk I will discuss the unique challenges posed by this domain and the different ways we can use technology to help, and explore the issues by presenting our experience of development and evaluation of a number of systems, including game-based, phone-based and online e-mental health interventions.
12 May
Alistair Edwards: The Crest Network
The Creative Speech Technology Network (Crest), is a network sponsored by EPSRC with an objective of bringing together people from a wide variety of backgrounds to develop and use speech synthesis technology. It had its inaugural meeting on 5-6 May in York and all signs are that it was successful in bringing together a diverse group of people with the potential to do some exciting work.
In this brief talk, I will summarize the events of the first meeting, and also talk about the fun and challenges of setting up such a network - with funding.
19 May
Chris Power & Helen Petrie: Further adventures in card sorting
26 May
Chris Power & Helen Petrie: Remote testing of WCAG techniques
2 June
Helen Petrie, Mark Blythe & John Clark: F for Fake: Four Studies on How We Fall for Phish
This talk will report on findings from a multi-method set of four studies that investigate why we continue to fall for phish. Current security advice suggests poor spelling and grammar in emails can be signs of phish. But a content analysis of a phishing archive indicates that many such emails contain no obvious spelling or grammar mistakes and often use convincing logos and letterheads. An online survey of 224 people finds that although phish are detected approximately 80% of the time, those with logos are significantly harder to detect. A qualitative interview study was undertaken to better understand the strategies used to identify phish. Blind users were selected because it was thought they may be more vulnerable to phishing attacks, however they demonstrated robust strategies for identifying phish based on careful reading of emails. Finally an analysis was undertaken of phish as a literary form. This identifies the main literary device employed as pastiche and draws on critical theory to consider why security based pastiche may be currently very persuasive.
9 June
Michael Harrison: Modelling and analysing the interactive behaviour of an infusion
pump
This talk is concerned with the scaleable and systematic analysis of interactive systems. The motivating problem is the procurement of medical devices. In such situations several different manufacturers offer solutions that support a particular clinical activity. Apart from cost, which is a dominating factor, the variations between devices are relatively subtle and the consequences of particular design features are not clear from manufacturers' manuals, demonstrations or trial uses. Despite their subtlety these differences can be important to the safety and usability of the device. The talk argues that formal analysis of the range of offered devices can provide a systematic means of comparison. The talk also explores barriers to the use of such techniques, demonstrating how layers of specification may be used to make it possible to reuse common specification. Infusion pumps provide a motivating example. A specific model is described and analysed and comparison between competitive devices is discussed.
16 June
Anne Bramwell-Dicks: Music as an affective medium
Auditory research in HCI has historically focused on using sounds to communicate information to users in the form of auditory messages to improve effectiveness, efficiency or accessibility of interaction. As HCI research has expanded into the field of User Experience the auditory HCI research has been left behind. This seminar will discuss how music can be used in HCI to affect elements of user experience and behaviour by considering how other fields (including Sports Psychology, Marketing, Music Psychology and Education) already exploit the affective properties of music. The results of our first small study into music, emotion and email will also be presented (again!).
Autumn Term 2011
All seminars are 13.15-14.15 on Thursdays in CSE/083 except where noted.
Abstracts
13 & 27 October
Paul Cairns, Alistair Edwards, Helen Petrie & Chris Power: My research and student projects
These seminars are intended as an opportunity for members of the Group - and particularly new members - to find out about the kind of research that goes on in the group. Each of the speakers will outline their general areas of interest and demonstrate how these have been reflected in the projects undertaken by some of their students.
20 October
Andrew Monk: Banking for the older old: what do they want?
TThe work described here is to explore the experiences the eighty and ninety year olds when accessing their finances both now and throughout their lives by understanding their intimate financial biographies. The researchers, working closely with people in this age group, are proposing how more appropriate future banking experiences might be imagined and designed.
3 November
Rebecca Randell, Leeds Institute of Molecular Medicine,
University of Leeds:
A virtual reality microscope for diagnostic pathology: physician
centred design and experimental evaluation
Background: Histopathologists diagnose cancer and other diseases by using a microscope to examine glass slides containing sections of tissue. Technological advances mean that it is possible to completely digitise such slides so that they can be viewed on a computer screen, promising a number of benefits in terms of efficiency. Such increases in efficiency are essential, as an aging population and emphasis on early diagnosis results in greater pressure on histopathology services. However, it can take up to 60% longer to perform diagnoses using digital slides. The aim of the research presented here was to create and evaluate a virtual reality (VR) microscope that is as efficient as the conventional microscope, to support the introduction of digital slides into routine practice.
Methods: A VR microscope was designed and implemented by combining ultra-high resolution displays with VR technology, techniques for fast interaction, and high usability. The VR microscope was evaluated using a mixed factorial experimental design with technology and task as within-participant variables and grade of histopathologist as a between-participant variable. There were 16 participants in the evaluation.
Results: No significant difference in time to diagnosis was found between the conventional and VR microscope (F(1, 14) = 0.87, p > .05). There was a significant difference in the mean magnification used between the two conditions, with participants working at a higher level of magnification on the VR microscope (F(1, 7) = 40.18, p < .01). Subjective analysis suggests that on the VR microscope approximately double the magnification of that on the conventional microscope is required in order to identify diagnostic features.
Conclusions: These results, achieved with only minimal training, suggest that, with the right technology, efficient use of digital pathology for routine practice is a realistic possibility. Training in digital pathology should emphasise that this new technology does not replicate the conventional microscope and histopathologists need to relearn what they should expect to see at each level of magnification.
10 November
André Freire: Empirical Results from an Evaluation of the Accessibility of Websites
by Dyslexic Users
This seminar will present results from an empirical study on problems encountered by users with dyslexia when using websites. The study was performed by a user evaluation of 16 websites by a panel of 13 participants with dyslexia, each website evaluated by 10 distinct users. The results presented are based on 693 instances of accessibility and usability problems. Most frequent problems were related to navigation issues, problems with presentation and organisation of information, lack or misfunctioning of specific funtionality in websites, and issues with language.
17 November
Lucy Buykx: What cooks need from multimedia and textually enhanced recipes
Using recipes in a step-by-step format with multimedia enhancements has been found to increase confidence and enjoyment of cooking but the field lacks research with cooks on the problems they encounter, so it is unclear what granularity of recipe step and associated multimedia would best support them. The current study observed 16 cooks prepare 3 dishes using recipes in 3 different formats to understand what problems cooks have with recipes. Recipe format had a significant effect on the ratings given to the recipe for clarity and ease of use but not on time to complete the recipe. Analysis of cooking activity and cooks' feedback shows that cooks want (i) step-by-step recipes with ingredient quantities in the recipe step; (ii) pictures of the interim states of the recipe; (iii) videos of preparation of unfamiliar ingredients; and (iv) videos of preparation techniques with different types of utensils.
24 November
Jimmy Ang: 3D virtual environment in engaging older people in active living
There is an increasing need to find innovative activities to help the older population to maintain a healthy life. 3D virtual worlds, which can provide social engagement, entertainment and creativity as well as useful information and services for older people might offer a solution to this issue. Although emerging studies have begun to look into the benefits of virtual worlds in healthcare, little has been done in the context of older people. I will explore various issues regarding the use of 3D among older people and a number of empirical studies that look into these issues. Specifically, the talk will focus on the profiles of older users and their motivations of using 3D technology through automated data crawling from a online community dedicated to 3D virtual worlds. The talk will also present a study that looks into social engagement in a 3D collaborative shopping environment, compared to a conventional non-3D one.
1 December
Alistair Edwards: Interface design in the Real World
Toby Churchill Ltd manufacture Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) devices. In 2007 they released their latest product, the SL40 and I was asked to consult on the design of the user interface to this device. This is an interesting and difficult problem. Ideally such a device should ideally generate speech at conversational rates of around 150 words per minute (wpm). Very skilled typists may attain 60 wpm. Yet the kinds of people who have to use AACs cannot be skilled at typing; the conditions which mean they have to use an AAC (stroke, motor-neurone disease, brain injury etc) generally also affect their manual motor skills.
Where I would have wanted to apply user-centred techniques, commercial and practical limitations precluded this. Indeed, the reality of working in a commercial environment had a large effect on what I was able to do, and I will explain some of this in this talk.
8 December
Chris Newell: Should artificial voices 'ham it up'?
Computer generated artificial voices generally annoy or alienate people. Yet human voices that sound 'strange' may be expressive, engaging, alluring and exotic. Can the line between artificial (unappealing) and exotic (appealing) be said to be blurred when the context is right? Is that context performance; and if so can an artificial voice that is clearly performing a role, even 'hamming it up' be more appealing to listeners than a more understated voice. In brief can we invent appealing artificial voices that don't try to be real. In this short talk I will test the effectiveness of a well known artificial voice presented in the context of melodrama. The original meaning of melodrama was drama with music.
15 December
Alimran Nordin:
Immersion and time perception in games
Immersion is the most widely reported experience of playing videogames. Associated with the report of immersion is the loss of the sense of time spent playing games. This research aims to investigate how time is perceived and lost while playing videogames and relate this to the level of immersion players experienced. This research will primarily involve psychology-style experiments with people playing different videogames under different conditions along with questionnaire/interview studies of the gaming experience. The results will be important for better measuring the gaming experience and hence understanding how immersive games might lead to addictive behaviours.
There will be lamingtons and mince pies.
19 December
English mid-winter celebrations
This year we will venture out to Harewood House. It's going to be an all-day event including our own private tour of the House.
Approximate itinerary is as follows:
- 9:30am
- bus from the university
- 10:30am
- arrive at Harewood House, coffee/tea
- 11:00
- private tour of the house
- 12:15
- lunch (not a full Christmas lunch this year, but will include hot soup, seasonal sandwiches, mince pies)
- 14:00 - approx 15:30 (depending on weather, we will decide on the day)
- you are free to explore the gardens, gift shop etc
- approx 15:30
- bus back to the university
Cost will be £20 per person all included.
Spring Term 2012
All seminars are on Thursdays in CSE/082 except where noted.
| Date | Room | Speaker | Title (Links to abstract) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19 January | CSE/082 | Alistair Edwards | Relatively PC |
| 26 January | CSE/082 | ||
| 2 February | CSE/082 | Paul Cairns | The cool wall of HCI (Go to the wall) |
| 9 February | CSE/082 | Paul Cairns | Design criticism |
| 16 February | CSE/082 | Anna Bramwell-Dicks Dave Swallow |
The Big Question |
| 23 February | 3Sixty/RCH | John Robinson, Electronics | SWOT-ing the 3Sixty |
| 1 March | CSE/082 | Dave Swallow | Development in Context: Using Contextual Inquiry to explore the development of accessible websites |
| 8 March | CSE/082 | Paul Cairns | Can five be enough? Sample sizes in usability tests |
| 15 March | CSE/102-3 | Sarah Wiseman | Designing for the task: What numbers are really used
in hospitals? #errordiary |
Abstracts
19 January
Alistair Edwards: Relatively PC
Relatively PC is a play on DVD, produced by the University of Dundee. The play illustrates the problems experienced by a group of older people who are trying to come to terms with modern information technology. The play is one of a series, produced in order to help with requirements ellicitation and to assist interaction designers to appreciate the needs of the variety of their potential users.
In this seminar we will view the play and then discuss it. It is to be hoped that the discussion will proceed on two levels. Firstly, what are the implications for design highlighted by the play? Secondly, is the technique a valuable one in attempting to improve design?
2 February
Paul Cairns: The cool wall of HCI
Borrowing an idea from a certain TV programme about cars , we will be constructing a Cool wall of HCI. Attendees should bring 2, or 3 or 4 examples of what they think is cool in HCI. We will then all vote as to where they belong, between Seriously uncool to Sub-zero.
9 February
Paul Cairns: Design criticism
- Bring some designs that have strongly influenced you. These may be because you love them. It may be because you hate them.
- Be prepared to talk for about five minutes on the design and then we can collectively discuss the value of the design and what insights we might gain from it and where this design lesson could be usefully applied elsewhere.
- Demos of the designs such as websites, videos, gadgets or whatever are welcome
What's a design? Anything - it could be a part of an interface, a whole interface, a whole system of doing things or just a little trick that some system does well. It could be a game, a gadget, a website a bit of kit. Whatever. But it's a design not a process so no modelling techniques or research methods.
16 February
Anna Bramwell-Dicks & Dave Swallow: The Big Question
'Green' issues are a current hot topic in HCI (and the world in general). Anna is strongly of the opinion that we must be the generation that fixes the world. Whilst Dave doesn't care and would rather live in comfort now, than bother about the future of the planet.
As such, we would like to promote a debate about green HCI issues. Do you think they're important? Which camp do you belong to? Do you agree with Anna? Or Dave?
The session will start with brief presentations by Anna and Dave (good versus evil, if you like). Then we will split into two camps to discuss opinions further. Followed by a debate amongst the whole seminar group.
Come along prepared to argue your side, but also with an open mind, ready to have your views changed.
Hopefully this will be fun. Controversial opinions welcome.
Disclaimer: this abstract was prepared by Anna; hence, the blatant bias
23 February
John Robinson, Electronics: SWOT-ing the 3Sixty
The 3Sixty is a demo space within the Ron Cooke Hub that offers video/data projection onto four walls and 32 channels of sound. As Director of the Creative Technology Centre since October I have been working with others to identify collaboration, development, teaching and research activity in the 3Sixty. This seminar will show some of the material that has been developed across the full range of activity, but it is mainly about research. I will look at the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the technology and infrastructure and suggest areas in which it might allow the study of interesting research questions. Some of these are in HCI - particularly in information visualization and in computer supported cooperative work. I hope to get the group's insights, critiques and suggestions.
1 March
Dave Swallow:
Development in Context: Using Contextual Inquiry to explore
the development of accessible websites
There have been numerous initiatives over the last decade to improve web accessibility. However, numerous studies over the same period of time have demonstrated how web accessibility has barely improved and, in some cases, worsened.
The stakeholder with the greatest responsibility towards creating an accessible website is arguably the web developer yet few studies have considered the role in much detail. Those studies that have, have revealed that what web developers say about the accessibility of their websites and what they actually do in practice can be quite different.
To try and get to the bottom of this, David carried out a series of Contextual Inquiries with web developers in their natural habitat. In this seminar David will reflect both on what he has learned about web developers as well as the use of Contextual Inquiry as a qualitative research method.
8 March
Paul Cairns: Can five be enough? Sample sizes in usability tests
Usability testing is often set up like an experiment but uses only a handful of participants. This talk examines the argument forms that underpin usability tests and how these allow us to understand the sample sizes needed to conduct a good and useful test.
Slides (PowerPoint)
15 March
Sarah Wiseman:Designing for the task
In the English language, the letters of the alphabet do not occur with equal frequency. Some letters occur far more often than others, for example the letter ‘e’ occurs more frequently than ‘z’. In this talk we show that as with letters, digits too suffer from unequal distributions in some situations. Here we show that the most common digits being used when programming infusion pumps to administer drugs to patients are 0, 1, 2 and 5. The digit 9 is also frequently used to set an infusion to run at the maximum rate possible. With this information, we evaluate three current forms of infusion pump input with regards to the digits that are actually being programmed into the machines. We argue that the current number interface designs used in medical devices should take into account these findings in order to produce interfaces that are both more suitable for the task, and less error prone in use.
#errordiary
Understanding human error is an important part of making good choices about interaction design. In this paper we report an innovative approach to the collection of human error. Errordiary is an online repository of the funny, frustrating and sometimes fatal human errors that happen on a daily basis.