What is cognition?
The mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses
Examples: remembering, watching, listening
Why should we understand users?
- Shows what users can be expected to do (or cannot)
- Identifies & explains the nature & causes of problems
- Develop theories, models, tools, guidance & methods that can lead to design of better products
What is attention?
“The process of selecting things to concentrate on, at a point in time, from the range of possibilities available”
What are the effects of attention?
- Allows us to focus on information that is relevant to what we are doing
- Involves audio and or visual senses
What are the effects of focused and divided attention?
- Enables us to be selective
- But limits our ability to keep track of everything
How to evaluate attention?
- Is information that needs attending to salient?
- What techniques are used to make things stand out?
- Is the interface cluttered?
- Is detail included just because the software allows it or is there enough room for it?
What is perception?
How we interpret/experience the world
What does perception involve?
- Using our senses to get information from the environment
- Transforming this information into experiences of objects, events, sounds, and tastes
How to evaluate perception?
- Do icons enable users to readily distinguish their meaning?
- Are bordering and spacing used to group information?
- Are sounds audible and distinguishable?
- Can you read the text? Can you distinguish it from the background
What is memory
Memory involves encoding and then retrieving knowledge
How does memory work?
- We don’t remember everything - it involves filtering and processing what is attended to
- Context is important in affecting our memory (i.e where, when) - it is hard to recall information that was encoded in a different context
How to evaluate memory?
- Does the system overload users’ memories with complicated procedures for carrying out tasks?
- Does the system support maintenance rehearsal and elaboration rehearsal?
- Do the interfaces promote recognition rather than recall (or support both)?
- Does the system provide users with a variety of ways of encoding digital information to help them remember where they have stored them?
What is the definition of recognition?
Recognition is when prompted you are able to figure out what the object is.
Example: menu
What is the definition of recall?
Recall is actively retrieving the information in your brain without any prompt or filters on
Example: Search
What does PQ4R stand for
- Preview
- Question
- Read
- Reflect
- Recite
- Review
Helps learn and remember content
What is the definition of mental model?
- Mental models are internal constructions of some aspect of the external world enabling predictions to be made
- Users develop an understanding of a system through learning and using it
Why do we need to know mental models?
People make inferences using mental models of how to carry out tasks
What is the definition of theory-based evaluation?
Theoretical understanding of human computer interactions
What is the definition of Expert-based Evaluation?
Experts compare the system to a set of heuristics or guidelines
When should you choose non-user evaluation methods?
- When users are not easily accessible
- Involving them is too expensive
- Or takes too long
- When your design ideas are not yet mature
