User Experience Re-Mastered Your Guide to Getting the Right Design- P9: Good user interface design isn't just about aesthetics or using the latest technology. Designers also need to ensure their product is offering an optimal user experience. This requires user needs analysis, usability testing, persona creation, prototyping, design sketching, and evaluation through-out the design and development process. | Analysis and Interpretation of User Observation CHAPTER 11 337 INTERPRETATION OF USER-OBSERVATION DATA Once you have analyzed your data - for example by grouping them according to a coding scheme - your final step is interpretation deciding what caused the defects that you have identified and recommending what to do about them. In Table we suggest a template for gathering defects and interpretations. Again some sample data have been entered into the table for the purposes of illustration. For the example task because the defect is related to the first action of the task and the task cannot be accomplished until the user chooses the right menu item we have assigned a severity rating of High. Notice that this form carefully preserves the distinction between our observations and our comments on them. Some practitioners prefer to gather the defects and the good points about the interface on a single form whereas others prefer to deal with all the defects and all the good points in two separate passes. Choose whichever method you prefer. Assigning Severities The process of summarizing the data usually makes it obvious which problems require the most urgent attention. In our form in Table we have included a column for assigning a severity to each defect. Bearing in mind our comments about statistics one important point to remember is that the weighting given to each participant s results depends very much on comparison with your overall user profile. Recommending Changes Some authorities stop here taking the view that it is the responsibility of the development team to decide what to change in the interface. For example the Common Industry Format for summative evaluation does not include a section for recommendations taking the view that deciding what to do is a separate process when undertaking a summative evaluation Data Interpretation Form for User Observations Session Date February 11 Task Scenario No. 1 Session Start Time 9 30 . Evaluator s Name John .
