1. Introduction to Human Factors in Information Systems Dr. Cindy Corritore Creighton University ITM 734 Fall 2005

2. Corritore, 2005 The key 3 legged stool –Content –Appearance –Usability Folks involved: –Graphic artists –Designers –Developers –Domain experts –HCI experts

3. Corritore, 2005 Usability The Human –Single user, groups, I/O channels, memory, reasoning, problem solving, error, psychology, perception, attention, cognitive resources The Computer –Desktop, embedded system, data entry devices, output devices, memory, processing, PDA, cell phone, Blackberry, …. The Interaction –Direct/indirect communication, models, frameworks, styles, ergonomics

4. Corritore, 2005 HCI and Human Factors Human-Computer Interaction Concerned with design, evaluation and implementation of interactive computing systems for human use. Interaction Design rather than Interface Design Usability vs. “easy to use” or “user friendly”

5. Corritore, 2005 Field of HCI HCI is an interdisciplinary field –Computer science (technology, applications) –Psychology (human capabilities, how humans interact) –Sociology (interaction between people, collaboration, groups, work) –Anthropology (how people work, interact with their environment) –Industrial Design (interactive products, engineering design)

6. Corritore, 2005 History Douglas Engelbart, 1962 “Augmenting Human Intellect: A Conceptual Framework” In 1968, workstation with a mouse, links across documents, chorded keyboard

7. Corritore, 2005 History XEROX Alto and Star –Windows –Menus –Scrollbars –Pointing –Consistency Apple LISA and Mac –Inexpensive –High-quality graphics –3rd party applications

8. Corritore, 2005 History Invention of machines (cars, electronic devices) taxed people’s sensorimotor abilities to control them Even after high degree of training, frequent errors (often fatal) Result: human factors became critically important.

9. Corritore, 2005 Problems However, designers still often consider cost and appearance over human factors Software development issues Bad design not always visible but sometimes blatantly obvious. Demand today –Product differentiation –More demanding consumer –“… just fix that with training …”

10. Corritore, 2005 Today’s state How many of you can program or use all aspects of your –digital watch? –Fax? –stereo system? “… no need to understand the underlying physics … (or code) of everything – simply the relationship between the controls and the outcomes” – Donald Norman

11. Corritore, 2005

12. Problems Computers far more complex to control than most physical devices Most computer applications require component that provides for direct interaction with user. This component typically represents more than half a system’s lines of code. Goes way beyond intuition.

13. Corritore, 2005 HCI goals easy to learn easy to use/efficient user satisfaction –enjoy it –meet goals with it

14. Corritore, 2005 Human factors overview Main topics: –Senses: vision, audition, touch, taste –Perception –Memory –Attention –Language –Metaphor –Cognition –Reasoning Design Evaluation

15. Corritore, 2005 What do humans do well? Sense low level stimuli Pattern recognition Inductive reasoning Multiple strategies Adapting Hard and fuzzy things

16. Corritore, 2005 What do computers do well? Counting and measuring Accurate storage and recall Rapid and consistent responses Data processing/calculation Repetitive actions Simple and sharply defined things

17. Corritore, 2005 So …. Let humans do: –Sensing of low level stimuli –Pattern recognition –Inductive reasoning –Multiple strategies –Adapting –Creating Let computers do: –Counting and measuring –Accurate storage and recall –Rapid and consistent responses –Data processing –Calculation –Repetitive actions

18. Corritore, 2005 Evaluate user interfaces Evaluate user interfaces whenever possible Analyze interfaces that are annoying or troublesome - why? bad design? Watch other users of the interface Test with actual users

19. Corritore, 2005 references websitesthatsuck.com http://www.hcibib.org/hci-sites/ http://www.acm.org/sigchi/