On the effective use and reuse of HCI knowledge

People and Computers IX, 1994

The human-computer interaction (HCI) community is generating a large number of analytic approaches such as models of user cognition and user-centred design representations. However, their successful uptake by practitioners depends on how easily they can be understood, and how usable and useful they are. We present a framework which identifies four different 'gulfs' between HCI modelling and design techniques and their intended users. These gulfs are potential opportunities to support designers if techniques can be encapsulated in appropriate forms. Use of the gulfs framework is illustrated in relation to three very different strands of work: (i) representing HCI design spaces and design rationale, (ii) modelling user cognition and (iii) modelling interactive system behaviour. We summarise what is currently known about these gulfs, report empirical investigations showing how these gulfs can be 'bridged,' and describe plans for further investigations. We conclude that it is desirable for practitioners' requirements to shape analytic approaches much earlier in their development than has been the case to date. The work reported in this paper illustrates some of the techniques which can be recruited to this end.

Proceedings of the 11th Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2012

ABSTRACT Designers often use previous knowledge during design activities. Case-Based Reasoning (CBR) systems have been used to help designers deal with a large repertoire of past design cases in many domains, like architecture and software. However, we still have little work that addresses Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) design in CBR systems. In general, they focus on specific HCI design artifacts, considering just a few aspects of HCI solutions. In this paper, we review related works to propose an enlarged conceptual model for HCI design cases in CBR systems. The model is flexible and extensible to accommodate different design artifacts, supporting different design processes and cultures. We have evaluated our conceptual model with a qualitative research, in which participants were asked to index and retrieve cases during an HCI design activity, referring to characteristics of context of use, domain, user, user goal, interaction, user interface, and system. The results indicate that CBR systems for HCI design should consider a wide view of the HCI problem and solution spaces, and the proposed conceptual model has great potential to support designers in dealing with a large repertoire of HCI design cases in CBR systems.

2018 11th International Conference on Human System Interaction (HSI)

Despite incompatible theoretical perspectives on emotion in psychology, researchers in HCI continue to identify frustration as a basic negative affective reaction or emotion, a single predictor of goal satisfaction and a persistent problem with use of technology. Applying the Grounded Theory approach, we argue that the reported causes of frustration were not necessarily resulting in frustrating experiences, making frustration an unreliable predictor and at best a small part of a bigger problem: an individual negative experience, which we argue is a better predictor. The Grounded Theory approach allowed us to better generalize newly emerged concepts and categories, connecting them causally, consequentially or conditionally to human use of technology. This paved the way to find a knowledge gap in HCI theory, treating basic psychological needs from an eudaimonic perspective, and which could be addressed by developing potentially universally applicable new design principles. The emerged concepts include: a) the human-complex system interaction construct; b) the distinction of reactive and proactive design approaches; c) the perspective of designing for human well-being; and d) four distinct phases of disrupted interaction. In addition, we propose specific steps for the evaluation of HCI design to help minimize negative user experience.

Proceedings of the SIGCHI …, 2007

For years the HCI community has struggled to integrate design in research and practice. While design has gained a strong foothold in practice, it has had much less impact on the HCI research community. In this paper we propose a new model for interaction design research within HCI. Following a research through design approach, designers produce novel integrations of HCI research in an attempt to make the right thing: a product that transforms the world from its current state to a preferred state. This model allows interaction designers to make research contributions based on their strength in addressing under-constrained problems. To formalize this model, we provide a set of four lenses for evaluating the research contribution and a set of three examples to illustrate the benefits of this type of research. Author Keywords design, interaction design, interaction design research, HCI research, research through design, wicked problems, design theory, design method ACM Classification Keywords H5.2. User Interfaces: Theory and methods.

When looking out across the intellectual landscape of HCI, how do we make sense of it? More impor- tantly, how do we evaluate what constitutes legitimate investigation? As an interdisciplinary field, HCI faces challenges in incorporating sometimes conflicting intellectual approaches. While new approaches enrich our view of interaction, they can also lead to conflicting notions of methodology and validity, whose resolution remains murky without explicit discussion of their underlying epistemological commit- ments. Informal histories of HCI commonly identify two major intellectual waves that have formed the field: the first orienting from engineering and human factors with its focus on optimizing man-machine fit, and the second stemming from cognitive science, with an increased emphasis on theory and on what is happening not only in the computer but, simultaneously, in the human mind. HCI also draws on a wide variety of apparently disparate approaches, such as participatory design, si...

2008

In recent years, a number of academic institutions around the world have worked to integrate design practice and thinking with engineering and behavioral science in support of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) education and research. While the HCI community generally has been enthusiastic about the benefits that design can bring to this developing interdisciplinary field, tension exists around the role of design in research, because no agreed upon model for a design research contribution exists.

Human–Computer Interaction, 2000

We identify a problem with the process of research in the HCI community-an overemphasis on "radical invention" at the price of achieving a common research focus. Without such a focus, it is difficult to build on previous work, to compare different interaction techniques objectively, and to make progress in developing theory. These problems at the research level have implications for practice, too; as researchers we often are unable to give principled design advice to builders of new systems. We propose that the HCI community try to achieve a common focus

Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2015

Research in HCI involves a wide variety of knowledge production-bringing forth theories, guidelines, methods, practices, design case studies / exemplars, frameworks, concepts, qualities and so on. This workshop is about mapping out the spaces, forms and potentials of such knowledge production in interaction design research.

Proceedings of the 2014 conference on Designing interactive systems - DIS '14, 2014

There has been an ongoing conversation about the role and relationship of theory and practice in the HCI community. This paper explores this relationship privileging a practice perspective through a tentative model, which describes a "bubble-up" of ideas from practice to inform research and theory development, and an accompanying "trickle-down" of theory into practice. Interviews were conducted with interaction designers, which included a description of their use of design methods in practice, and their knowledge and use of two common design methods-affinity diagramming and the concept of affordance. Based on these interviews, potential relationships between theory and practice are explored through this model. Disseminating agents already common in HCI practice are addressed as possible mechanisms for the research community to understand practice more completely. Opportunities for future research, based on the use of the tentative model in a generative way, are considered.

2009

The human-computer interaction (HCI) community is diverse. Academics and practitioners from science, engineering, and design contribute to its lively development, but communication and cooperation between the different groups is often challenging. Designers struggle to apply the results of scientific studies to their design problems. At times, open conflicts between the different groups emerge, in particular between scientists and designers, since they have the least common ground. 1