06.14.2010
Barry Beith /
Design Research /
Ergonomics /
Human Factors /
Industrial Design /
User Experience /
User Research
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is chartered with protecting the public from bad product design and recalls thousands of cribs due to the inability of some parents to follow directions. Now granted, often many designs and instructions for assembly are so bad as to be flagrant violations of all that is “design holy”, still three to four million cribs. And why, because a handful of children are injured, a smaller number die. Please don’t over-react. I understand the anguish of parents who lose a child or who are feeling guilty because their child was harmed or frightened. I get the anger they feel in this day and age over desperately needing to find the right scapegoat. However, the penalty seems to vastly outweigh the crime here and the solution seems to be all wrong.
Read more »
04.07.2010
Andrew Wirtanen /
Gestural Interfaces /
New Technology /
Usability /
User Research
This video is a reminder that there’s so much we can learn from watching others. This 2.5 year-old discovers a common problem that adults encounter: if you hold the iPad with your thumb on the screen, then you can’t use another finger to select an application on the home screen. The problem is that many people will find it natural to hold the iPad this way and now need to change their behavior to accommodate the device.
I am not sure whether Apple knew about this issue beforehand or not, but it demonstrates the importance of testing before release. Here’s a great quote I saw this morning on Twitter:
“A usability test is going to happen before or after you launch. The question is whether you want to be there or not.” - tsharon
Source: YouTube via Laughing Squid
01.05.2010
Andrew Wirtanen /
Medical /
User Research
A checklist is one of the most useful tools during a usability study. It may seem trivial to check a box every time one starts or stops a video recording, but even the brightest researchers will forget at some point.
NPR’s Morning Edition did a great piece with surgeon and author Atul Gawande. Gawande discussed his own experience where doctors were hesitant to use checklists, probably because of perceptions that it was admitting weakness. After requiring a group of doctors to use checklists, 80% of them said they thought they were useful. When the same group was asked if they would want checklists used if they were having an operation, 94% said yes.
One of the most powerful statements in the interview:
I have not gotten through a week of surgery where the checklist has not caught a problem.
12.16.2009
Andrew Wirtanen /
Trends /
User Experience /
User Research /
Web & Software
I dread going to the mall during the holiday season (Black Friday to Christmas Eve). But, this past Sunday night I was able to find a parking spot very easily. I went into a store to make an exchange and found that there was no wait. Then, I did a little browsing and went on my way. Surprisingly, my experience actually wasn’t that bad.
But, I think I know why it was so easy…
Read more »
11.13.2009
Sean Farres /
Community Involvement /
Creativity /
Design Inspiration /
Graphic Design /
Green Technology /
Human Factors /
Industrial Design /
Local /
User Research
What a great meeting at the TriUPA & HFES Carolina World Usability Day event. HumanCentric had the opportunity to present our new recycling solution to this year’s design challenge. It goes without saying we were the clear winners in the design challenge (well… we were the only entry, but let’s not get caught up in the details…). The audience was very receptive and had lots of great questions about our process, information graphic and in-home bin prototype. Click here to view our presentation.
Many audience members wanted our solution implemented across the Triangle to jump-start awareness and increase recycling. HumanCentric is very excited about the community support and would love to have our vision for a better recycling system become a reality. If you would like to join our campaign for a greener Triangle please contact Alexander Hussain at HumanCentric. HumanCentric’s next steps are to connect local government officials to present our improved recycling solution.
-
-
Alex presenting our solution
-
-
Information Graphic
-
-
Sean’s demo
10.22.2009
Jon Howarth /
Community Involvement /
Gestural Interfaces /
Human Factors /
User Experience /
User Research
Dr. Dan Mauney and Dr. Miranda Capra gave a presentation at a “works-in-progress” forum on Tuesday, October 20 at 1:30pm at this year’s Annual Conference of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society in San Antonio, TX. Dan and Miranda’s talk was titled “Cultural Influence on Gestural Interface Design”. They described a recent study conducted in association with the International Usability Partners in which they collected user-generated gestures from 40 people in 9 countries for 28 common software commands (e.g. zoom, scroll, cut, copy, rotate).
Dan is releasing regular blog posts about the study at http://www.humancentric.com/GestureResearch.
10.21.2009
Jon Howarth /
Usability Lab /
User Research
Do you ever find that you need to create a recording of two camera feeds? We developed a way that uses only free software (if you have Microsoft Windows) and is pretty straightforward. Read more »
10.09.2009
Jon Howarth /
Usability Lab /
User Research /
Web & Software
Usability professionals and other research-focused professions often find the need to record screen video. This blog entry is intended to introduce you to basic approaches to capturing screen video and to explain the tradeoffs associated with these approaches…
Read more »
09.29.2009
Andy Hamilton /
Design Research /
Industrial Design /
User Research
Thanks to everyone who made it out of bed and to our presentation at 9 am on Saturday! We appreciated the attentive ears, questions and discussion after the early morning presentation. For those of you who maybe had one too many caipirinhas at Luminaire, or couldn’t make the conference altogether, we wanted to share our paper and presentation with you. While this is a pretty mild substitute for the real deal, together they should give you a pretty good indication of what we were about. Enjoy!
Transparent User-Centered Design on a Dime (PDF, 310 KB)
09.28.2009
Mark Dezelon /
Consumer Products /
Human Factors /
Industrial Design /
News /
User Research
HumanCentric contributed to an article on industrial design in the September issue of Appliance Design magazine. Dr. Barry Beith, founder and CEO, along with Brian Chiarizia, IDSA, Manager of Industrial Design, and Dr. Christina Mendat, Manager and Senior Human Factors Specialist, contributed their thoughts to the importance of functionality and human factors when it comes to product design of professional and commercial appliances.
In the article titled Design that Means Business by Steve Wichelecki, Brian noted that the size and use of many professional/commercial appliances have potential safety hazards that must be considered in the product’s functionality. Barry added to that by stating, “regardless of whether the design of a professional/commercial or consumer appliance is in question, products need to be safe, perform to consumer quality expectations, and be intuitive/easy to learn.”
Christina expands on the approach of designing appliances by discussing various methods to uncover user needs. “Within each area there will be a great amount of variability in terms of day-to-day interaction, pain points and general perceptions; therefore, it is important that research involve as many participants as possible, collecting both qualitative and quantitative data.” She cites ethnography and task analysis as methods for understanding user needs.
Brian and Christina represent the complimentary skill sets of design and research at HumanCentric, where the integration of these disciplines is leveraged on all projects for a variety of clients in the following domains: consumer products, transportation, telecom, web/software and medical. While at HumanCentric, Brian and Christina have partnered on such diverse products as small cooking appliances, a dry powder inhaler, a zero-turn lawn mower and a next-generation gaming console interface.
Appliance Design is a publication with a focus on design and engineering in the appliance industry. For more information, read the full article at http://tinyurl.com/yapq4p5.
