Usability Test for an HFS Oven

Usability Test for an HFS OvenReksha Rathnam and Mahir Bathija

Reksha Rathnam and I, Mahir Bathija, conducted a usability test on the standard HFS Oven for our HCDE class.

Details of our Study Test Moderator: Mahir Bathija Note taker: Reksha Rathnam Test Date: Tuesday, April 19 User Group: Freshman who live in the dorms at UW Differ in cooking experience

The test moderator was myself and the note taker was reksha. I clearly dictated the tasks to each of the users and reksha took down notes on each of the users as they performed their tasks. We conducted the test on Tuesday April 19 and we chose a user group of freshman who live in the dorms at UW. We also chose students that differed in baking experience.

Instructions to Users Scenario: You need to make cookies for your club! Pre-heat oven at 350 degrees Reason: After getting the notification that the oven is preheated, place cookies in the oven and set the kitchen timer to 10 minutes Reason: After timer notification, take out cookies and turn the oven off. Reason: Data Types: Completion (Yes/ No), Time (seconds), Difficulty Level (scale 1-5)

The scenario given to each of the users was that they had to bake cookies as a part of their club at UW.The first task was to switch on the oven and pre heat it to 350 degrees farenhiet. The second task was to place the cookies in the oven and set the kicthen timer to 10 minutes after hearing the notification ring for the completeion of the pre heating phase. And finally the third task was to take the cookies out and turn of the oven after hearing the timer go off. We collected three data types for each of the tasks the user performed. The first type, was the completeion of the task under the time limit set. We recorderd weather the user completed the task or not. The second was the time in seconds that each user took to complete each task. Lastly the third data type was a difficulty scale from 1-5, 1 being easy and 5 being difficult.

User 1: Saakshi Dulani Info About User: Gender: Male/Female Baking Experience: medium

More notes: Confused about whether to turn on the oven before hand Set timer for 10 hours instead of 10 minutes but had easy time fixing mistake Struggled to find position to remove pan

Tasks Complete Task? (Y/N)Time (seconds) Difficulty Scale (1-5)Task 1 (pre-heat)Yes252Task 2 (place cookies, set timer) Yes403Task 3 (take cookies, turn off) Yes 452

The first user is Saakshi Dulani, who lives in Alder Hall, and who has a medium baking experience. Shecompleted all the tasks but struggled in setting the timer. She set the timer for 10 minutes instead of 10hours so therefore rated the task a difficulty level of 3. She preheated the oven in 25 seconds and tookthe cookies out in 45 seconds. She rated both these tasks at a level of two and seemed very easy for her.

User 2: Kush TekriwalInfo About User: Gender: MaleBaking Experience: light

More notes: Struggled to understand pre-heat means bake Struggled to remove tray

Tasks Complete Task? (Y/N)Time (seconds) Difficulty Scale (1-5)Task 1 (pre-heat)Yes353Task 2 (place cookies, set timer) Yes302Task 3 (take cookies, turn off) Yes604

The second user was Kush Tekriwal, who lives in Poplar Hall, and who has a light baking experience. He completed all the tasks but struggled to understand preheating the oven.He also struggled to remove the tray of cookies after they were baked as he had never taken out something so hot from the oven. He took a whole minute to complete this task and rated it 4/5 on the difficulty scale.

User 3: Nivedita ArvindInfo About User: Gender: Female Baking Experience: high

More notes: Easy time doing everything Struggled to understand timer

Tasks Complete Task? (Y/N)Time (seconds) Difficulty Scale (1-5)Task 1 (pre-heat)Yes201Task 2 (place cookies, set timer) Yes252Task 3 (take cookies, turn off) Yes302

The third user was niv, who lives in elm Hall, and who has a high level of baking experience. she completed all the tasks but took a bit more time to use the timer as she had never used the oven timer before. However, she completed the task easily and only rated it 2/5 on the difficulty scale.

Summary of Results All the users were able to complete their three individual tasks in the time limit (60 seconds) provided for each task.More experienced users took significantly less time to complete each of the tasks given to them.More experienced users found it significantly easier to complete the tasks given to them.

After tabulating our data and interpreting our results we came to a conclusion that the oven had an overall good design as all tasks were able to be completed by users with all types of baking experience. We realised that the more experienced users took significantly less time to complete each task and also rated a lower diffivulty level on the scale compred to those with lesser baking experience.

What we might do different next time?Next time, we may choose to pick users with no baking experience so as to compare the results between them. Choosing individuals with different baking experiences gives an unfair advantage to the people who have used an oven before.

Next time we would pick users for our test with minimal or not baking experience so that we can actually test the dicciculty level of using the oven. With everyone being on the same experince level, no one will have an unfair adv

Thank You !