INFO 310 User Centered Design

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INFO 310User Centered Design
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User centered design (Allen, 1996)

• Identify a user population
• Investigate the information needs of the user
  group
• Discover the tasks that users accomplish as they
  meet these information needs
• Investigate the resources that users require to
  complete these tasks
• Summarize the preceding steps in user models
• Consider each design decision in the light of
  resource augmentation and enabling

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Identify a user population

• The first step in user-centered design is to find
  a user population.
• Sometimes user identification is dictated by the
  mission of the organization where the designer
  works. In other cases, users may be selected by
  the designer.
• The identification of the user population is such
  an obvious step that it is sometimes omitted.
  This omission results in systems that are not
  particularly usable for any set of users.

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Investigate the information needs of the user
group

• Information needs can be investigated using a
  wide range of research methods.
• The key element of this step is to talk to users
  and find out what kinds of information they need
  to resolve the problems they encounter.
• No information system can meet all of the
  information needs of a user group.
• Once the full range of information needs has been
  identified, system designers must select those
  that their information system will be designed to
  meet.

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Discover the tasks that users accomplish as they
meet these information needs

• Talk to users and observe them as they work on
  meeting their information needs.
• Identify the tasks that users employ as they meet
  their information needs and how they accomplish
  these tasks.
• Try to distinguish between the tasks that are
  essential and those that are optional.
• The result will be one or more task models for
  each information need.

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Investigate the resources that users require to
complete these tasks

• Each task completed by a user who is meeting an
  information need requires a variety of resources
  background knowledge, procedural knowledge, and
  abilities.
• List the resources required for each task and
  identify the level of the resources required.
• It is important to note the levels of these
  resources that users possess.

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Summarize the preceding steps in user models

• For each distinct user group to be served by the
  information system, there will be a number of
  information needs that the system is designed to
  meet.
• For each of these information needs, there will
  be a number of tasks that must be accomplished.
• For each of the tasks, there will be a list of
  resources that are necessary.
• Integrating these elements together results in a
  user model that can be used to guide design
  decisions or that can be implemented as part of
  the information system to direct how the system
  will respond to users.

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Break out session 10 minutesSummarize the
preceding steps in user models for the
recruitment arm of the American Red Cross
User group
Information needs
Tasks
Resources
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Consider each design decision in the light of
resource augmentation and enabling

• The goal of system design is to allow users to
  complete the tasks that will meet their
  information needs. With this in mind, system
  features that will augment the resources of users
  when necessary will enable them to complete the
  tasks.
• Some of these features will be required by all
  users, while others will be required by only a
  portion of the user group. Experimental research
  can be used to select system features that should
  be implemented as user-selectable options.

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Value Sensitive Design (Friedman et al,
forthcoming)

• ...a theoretically grounded approach to the
  design of technology that accounts for human
  values in a principled and comprehensive manner
  throughout the design process.

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What are values and can we incorporate them in
design?

• the economic worth of an object
• what a person or group of people consider
  important in life
• morality, ethics
• facts vs. values

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Related Approaches

• computer ethics
• social informatics
• computer supported cooperative work (CSCW)
• participatory design

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Tripartite Methodology

• conceptual
• empirical
• technical

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Conceptual Investigations

• What values are implicated?
• trust
• anonymity
• security
• privacy
• etc...

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Empirical Investigations

• What can we infer by observing, measuring and
  documenting the activities of our user group?
• are values prioritized over usability?
• in interactive contexts what values or
  considerations are most important?

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Technical Investigations

• some technological solutions are more suitable
  for certain activities
• they may support certain values and make others
  more difficult to realize
• video - based collaborative work spaces
• video surveillance !
• bio - identification systems
• fingerprinting
• optical scanning

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Case Studies

• Cookies and Informed Consent in Web Browsers
• Office Window of the Future
• UrbanSim

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Using Value Sensitive Design

• begin with a value, technology or specific
  context of use
• identify direct and indirect stakeholders
• identify benefits and harms for each stakeholder
  group
• map benefits and harms onto corresponding values
• conduct a conceptual investigation of key values
• identify potential value conflicts
• integrate value considerations in to the
  organizational structure
• consider human values with ethical import
• interview stakeholders
• conduct technical investigations

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Break out 15 minutes

• Consider user centered design and value sensitive
  design side by side
• Your teams job is to analyze the American Red
  Cross website by brainstorming on who the
  stakeholders (both direct and indirect) are,
  their information needs and the values supported
  or undermined through the site as it is now
• Make recommendations to enhance the website that
  address HIB and value sensitive design.

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Synthesis

• The goal of user centered system design is to
  provide users the means to complete tasks that
  will meet their information needs.
• The value sensitive design approach strives to
  incorporate universal human values into the
  design of information and computational systems.
• This in turn will provide the user with a means
  to conduct their work or meet their information
  needs in an arena that supports universal values.