Contextual Inquiry Preparation for Tuesday, 9/9/14

The Contextual Interview "Contextual Inquiry seeks to provide rich detail about customers by taking team members into the field. Once there, apprenticeship suggests an attitude of inquiry and learning." (B&H, p. 46) – Recall the in-home interviews in Swan et al. Analyst/designer observes the user doing normal things in the normal setting User is the expert, analyst/designer is the apprentice.

Journey: General Motors’ more to incorporate Contextual Design into its next generation of automotive HMI designs (Gellatly et al. 2010) This is a case study of the use of the contextual inquiry to develop new ideas and opportunities for car design. – “gaining a deeper understanding of how drivers interact with today’s entertainment, communication, navigation, and information systems in their vehicles.” – “learn how drivers balanced interacting with these systems with the primary task of driving in situ” – “[help]..to concept and create the next generation of infotainment systems that support and extend these in-vehicle experiences, creating delight for customers of new GM vehicles” (from the Abstract) Note the specific goals given in the Introduction.

Interviewer Task Participant (Interviewee) Framework for Contextual Interview {Interviewer, Participant, Task} + {Relationships between them} Consider the questions on the next 2 slides as you read the article, and be ready to discuss your responses in class.

Interviewer Task Participant (Interviewee) Interviewer Why did they try to have 2 interviewers for each session? What were their roles and responsibilities? Participant How did they select participants – what were the criteria? Did they represent a useful range of drivers? Could the selection of participants have been improved? If so, how? How did these participants differ from the people they consulted in the past? Task What were the participants asked to do? Does this represent a useful range of tasks? Are there ways in which the task could have been improved to provide better information? If so, how?

Interviewer Task Participant (Interviewee) Interviewer-Participant Describe the interactions between the interviewer and the participant (questions, prompts, etc.) Are there ways the interviewers could have gotten more useful information? Did the participants feel they were able to express their views, ideas, and concerns? Participant-Task Was the tasks something the participants felt comfortable doing (i.e., were they the task “experts”?) Were the participants able to perform the task in their normal manner? If not, why not, and are there ways the problem could be avoided? Task-Interviewer Did the task allow the interviewers to learn what they needed to learn? Could the interviewers have learned what they needed by doing the task themselves, without the participants? Why or why not?

After you’ve read the article… The authors used 2 arguments to convince managers that they had gained information that was reliable enough to based design decisions on. – “we began to see repeated behaviors among separate users in different locations.” (p. 159) (in other words, saturation) – “User’s intents are more stable than their actions or preferences; actions and preferences may change once they upgrade to the latest software on a particular device, but their intents remain stable.” (p. 159) Do you agree with this statement?

Workforce Mobility Video What is it like to conduct a Contextual Interview with a person driving a car? There may be some risks with this method – what alternate ways can you think of to learn about a driver’s information needs/desired as a “mobile worker”? – Would the information you gather be as helpful?