Evolving Evaluation: from Engineers to Experience

Stanford UniversityHuman-Computer

Interaction Seminar

27 April 2007

Joseph ‘Jofish’ KayeCornell University, Ithaca NYjofish @ cornell.edu

What is evaluation?• Part of the design-build-

evaluate iterative design cycle

• A comparison of ‘built’ to ‘planned’

• A place to reflect on both this and the next design

But also…• A way of defining a field• A way a discipline validates

the knowledge it creates.

What is evaluation?• Something you do at the end

of a project to show it works…• … so you can publish it.• A reason papers get rejectedWhich are other ways of

saying:• A way of defining a field• A way a discipline validates

the knowledge it creates.• A validation of a design and

knowledge about that design

HCI Evaluation: Validity“Methods for establishing

validity vary depending on the nature of the contribution. They may involve empirical work in the laboratory or the field, the description of rationales for design decisions and approaches, applications of analytical techniques, or ‘proof of concept’ system implementations”

CHI 2007 Website

So…• How and why did we end up

with the system(s) we use for HCI evaluation today?

• How can our current approaches to evaluation deal with novel concepts of HCI, such as third-wave or experience-focused (rather than task focused) HCI?

• And in particular…

The Virtual Intimate Object (VIO)• A device for couples in long

distance relationships to communicate intimacy

• When one partner clicks, the other’s circle lights up, and then fades over time.

• www.intimateobjects.orgKaye & Goulding. Intimate Objects. Proc. DIS’04Kaye, Levitt, Nevins, Golden & Schmidt.

Communicating Intimacy One Bit at a Time. Ext. Abs. CHI 2005.

Kaye. I just clicked to say I love you. alt.chi, Ext. Abs. CHI 2006.

Evaluation of the VIO• It’s about the experience; it’s

not about the task• How can we measure intimacy

and the transmission thereof?

Kaye, Levitt, Nevins, Golden & Schmidt. Communicating Intimacy One Bit at a Time. Ext. Abs. CHI 2005.

Kaye. I just clicked to say I love you. alt.chi, Ext. Abs. CHI 2006.

The 19 Hearts Problem

The 19 Hearts Problem:

How can you evaluate the ineffable?

Understanding how we got to where we are today

1. Evaluation by Engineers2. Evaluation by Computer

Scientists3. Evaluation by Experimental

Psychologists & Cognitive Scientists

4. Evaluation by HCI Professionals

5. (Evaluation in CSCW)6. Evaluation for Experience

(with case studies)1. Evaluation by Engineers2. Evaluation by Computer

Scientists3. Evaluation by Experimental

Psychologists & Cognitive Scientists

a. Evaluation of Text Editors4. Evaluation by HCI Professionals

a) Damaged Merchandise5. Evaluation in CSCW6. Evaluation for Experience

1. The VIO2. Home Health Horoscopes3. The Whereabouts Clock

HCI History:3 Questions to ask about an era

• Who are the users?• Who are the evaluators?• What are the limiting

factors?

• P.S. And note the simplification

Evaluation by Engineers• Users are engineers &

mathematicians• Evaluators are engineers• The limiting factor is

reliability

Evaluation by Computer Scientists

• Users are programmers• Evaluators are

programmers• The speed of the machine

is the limiting factor

Evaluation by Experimental Psychologists& Cognitive Scientists• Users are users: the

computer is a tool, not an end result

• Evaluators are cognitive scientists and experimental psychologists: they’re used to measuring things through experiment

• The limiting factor is what the human can do

Case Study of ExPsych / CogSci Evaluation: Text Editors

Roberts & Moran, 1982, 1983.

Their methodology for evaluating text editors had three criteria:objectivitythoroughnessease-of-use

Case Study: Text Editorsobjectivity “implies that the methodology not

be biased in favor of any particular editor’s conceptual structure”

thoroughness “implies that multiple aspects of editor use be considered”

ease-of-use (of the method, not the editor itself)“the methodology should be usable by editor designers, managers of word processing centers, or other nonpsychologists who need this kind of evaluative information but who have limited time and equipment resources”

Case Study: Text Editorsobjectivity “implies that the methodology not

be biased in favor of any particular editor’s conceptual structure”

thoroughness “implies that multiple aspects of editor use be considered”.

ease-of-use (of the method (not the editor itself),“the methodology should be usable by editor designers, managers of word processing centers, or other nonpsychologists who need this kind of evaluative information but who have limited time and equipment resources.”

Case Study: Text Editors

Text editors are the white rats of HCI

Thomas Green, 1984,in Grudin, 1990.

Evaluation by Usability Professionals• Evaluators are usability

professionals (often with Exp.Psych/CogSci backgrounds)

• Users are white collar, with non-IT jobs, just using computers

• The limiting factor is the time of the worker accomplishing their job

Evaluation by HCI Professionals• They believe in expertise

over experiment (Nielsen 1984)

• They’ve made a decision to decide to focus on better results, regardless of whether they were experimentally provable or not.

Case Study: The Damaged Merchandise Debate

Damaged Merchandise Setup

Early eighties:usability evaluation methods (UEMs)- heuristics (Neilsen)- cognitive walkthrough- GOMS- …

Damaged Merchandise Comparison Studies

Jeffries, Miller, Wharton and Uyeda (1991)

Karat, Campbell and Fiegel (1992)

Nielsen (1992)Desuirve, Kondziela, and

Atwood (1992)Nielsen and Phillips (1993)

Damaged Merchandise Panel

Wayne D. Gray, Panel at CHI’95

Discount or Disservice? Discount Usability Analysis at a Bargain Price or Simply Damaged Merchandise

Damaged Merchandise Paper

Wayne D. Gray & Marilyn Salzman

Special issue of HCI:Experimental Comparisons of

Usability Evaluation Methods

Damaged Merchandise ResponseCommentary on Damaged

MerchandiseKarat: experiment in contextJeffries & Miller: real-worldLund & McClelland: practicalJohn: case studiesMonk: broad questionsOviatt: field-wide scienceMacKay: triangulateNewman: simulation & modelling

Damaged Merchandise Clash of Paradigms

Experimental Psychologists & Cognitive Scientists

(who believe in experimentation) vs.

HCI Professionals (who believe in experience and expertise, even if ‘unprovable’) (and who were trying to present

their work in the terms of the dominant paradigm of the

field.)

Damaged Merchandise Clash of Paradigms• It’s not about who’s right• It’s about presenting work in

the terms of the dominant paradigm of the field

• It’s about recognizing what paradigm clashes look like in HCI

• It’s thinking about how to recognize and re-think our own approaches to knowing and doing HCI

Experience Focused HCI

• A possibly emerging sub-field, drawing from traditions and disciplines outside the field

• Emphasis on the experience, not [just] the task

• Thinking about technology as more like… a car than a text editor

• Wright & McCarthy, Gaver, Blythe, Höök, Taylor & Swan, Bødker, Peterson, Isbister…

Experience Focused HCI

• For example…• How can you evaluate a car?• Why do you drive what you

drive?– Grad-student-chic? – Eco-chic?– Machismo? Safety? Gay? Speed?

• For users, ‘HCI’ is cultural as well as technological

• We’ll fail if we evaluate purely on task

Experience Focused HCI

• The users are everybody, in everyday life.

• The evaluators – perhaps - are ethnographers and designers and documentary filmmakers and writers and playwrights

• The limiting factor might be how to express oneself, how to be and be seen (or not).

• (P.S. This stuff’s harder from the inside than the outside.)

Evaluating Experience focused HCI: The Virtual Intimate Object

So how did we evaluate the VIO?

Kaye, Levitt, Nevins, Golden & Schmidt. Communicating Intimacy One Bit at a Time. Ext. Abs. CHI 2005.

Daily logbook entries:open ended, user interpreteddefamiliarizing questionsabout the situationimpacted by the technologyas well as the technology itselfthat leverageboth designers’ & users’ skillsin lay cultural interpretation.

Evaluating Experience focused HCI: The Virtual Intimate Object

Evaluating Experience focused HCI: The Virtual Intimate ObjectWhat color is your relationship?Has the VIO made you feel

closer to your partner? Further away?

What TV show represents your family? What song?

What director would direct a story about your mobile use?

Why? Kaye. I just clicked to say I love you. alt.chi, Ext.

Abs. CHI 2006.

Evaluating Experience focused HCI: The Virtual Intimate ObjectThe color that currently best represents my

relationship is…Amber/yellow --> do I proceed w/ caution or speed

up to beat the red or slow down anticipating a step

Purple - we have a more matured, aged relationship rather than a new, boundless one which would best be described by red. Purple is the more aged, ripened form of red.

Yellow! Like a sun, like a summer. I often laugh with Sven especially in those days. Using Vio is really funny and interesting.

Kaye, J. ‘J.’ I just clicked to say I love you. alt.chi, Ext. Abs. CHI 2006.

Experience focused HCI:cultural commentators

Gaver: cultural commentators with expertise in their own fields provide multiple levels of assessment.

Gaver, W. (2007) Cultural Commentators for Polyphonic Assessment. To appear, IJHCI.

Experience focused HCI:Home Health Horoscope• Domestic ubiquitous computing• Privacy-preserving sensors• Wellbeing in the home• Output to encourage reflection• Emphasis on the users’

interpretation• Designing for serendipity• Difficult problem

Gaver, Sengers, Kerridge, Kaye & Bowers. Home Health Horoscope. To appear Proc. CHI’07

Evaluating the Whereabouts ClockSecond round: 5 families, n=~303-10+ weeks per familyPhones, WAC for allOpen-ended diariesWeekly visitsSome guided brainstorming

Sellen, A., Eardley, R., Izadi, S., and Harper, R. The whereabouts clock: early testing of a situated awareness device. Ext. Abs. CHI’06

Some insights:

Location-in-interaction: the social and interactive affordances of location

Mums’ situated knowledge of expected events: technological output is not blindly accepted

Brown, Taylor, Izadi, Sellen, & Kaye. Locating Family Values: A Field Trial of the Whereabouts Clock. Under consideration for Ubicomp 2007.

Evaluating the Whereabouts Clock

An evolving discussionShameless plugs for those attending CHI:

alt.chi: Evaluating Evaluation (Monday 4:30p)paper: Home Health Horoscopes (Tuesday 2:30p)sig: Evaluating Experience-focused HCI (Thursday 9a)

Special thanks to Terry Winograd and my very good personal friend Wandy Jo.

Also thanks to Phoebe Sengers & the Culturally Embedded Computing Group, sBostonCHI, Alex Taylor, Ken Wood, Richard Harper, Abi Sellen, Shahram Izadi, Lorna Brown & the CMLG, Microsoft Cambridge, Apala Lahiri Chavan & Eric Schaffer, HFI, CHI Bangalore, CHI Mumbai, BostonCHI, the Cornell S&TS Department, Maria Håkansson & IT University Göteborg, Louise Barkhuus, Barry Brown & University of Glasgow, Mark Blythe & University of York, Andy Warr & the Oxford E-Research Center, Susanne Bødker, Marianne Graves Petersen & The University of Aarhus, Jonathan Grudin, Liam Bannon, Gilbert Cockton, William Newman, Kirsten Boehner, Jeff Hancock, Bill Gaver, Janet Vertesi, Kia Höök, Jarmo Laaksolahti, Anna Ståhl, Helen Jeffries, Paul Dourish, Jen Rode, Peter Wright, Ryan Aipperspach, Bill Buxton, Michael Lynch, Seth ‘Beemer’ McGinnis & Katherine Isbister.