Practical Usability Testing Flashcards
What is usability testing?
Process of having potential users experience site, software or product through performance based evaluation
Ongoing process
What is purpose of usability testing?
Feedback! And enable design improvements
Why do a usability test?
Validate design works
Diagnose problems
Compare alternatives
Verify design goals are met
What are the benefits to usability testing?
Direct feedback from users and not intermediaries
Provides data and not opinions
Saves development time and money
Positive ROI
What are some types of non-performance types of evaluation?
Expert review Heuristic Evaluations Subjective evaluations Preference tests Peer review Focus groups
Who is involved in a usability test?
Facilitator
Participant
Observer
What are 2 main types of usability testing?
Formative
Summative
What is a formative usability test?
Conducted during product or site development
Used to determine if a specific design objective is being met
What is an example of a formative usability test?
Can a user find and use the mortgage calculator to successfully enter appropriate loan information on an application?
What’s a summative usability test and when is it used?
Conducted at the end of development
Used to validate that a product has accomplished intended goals
What is an example of a summative test?
Has the new application form increased conversion at the expected rates?
What are the 2 main approaches to usability testing?
Small scale qualitative
Large scale quantitative
What is the small scale qualitative approach?
Provides many opportunities for observation
Based on expertise and judgement
The specialist observes, interprets, decides
Can use small sample sizes
Purpose is to find issues. Correct technique for iterative design (like agile)
NOT for statistical analysis. Does not represent whole user group
What is the large scale quantitative approach?
Focus is on quantitative measure
Results can be generalized to a larger population
Requires large sample size
How many users to test small scale qualitatively?
- Uncover 85% of problems. Test 3 times.
Better cost benefit than 1 test with 15 users
What is the law of diminishing returns in usability?
There are a finite number of UI issues. Each user will stumble upon same issues. More users will not help find more issues.
How do you present small scale qualitative results?
No statistics.
Present observations and suggestions.
(several users…blah blah. Here’s how we should redesign screen)
What is the magic number of participants for small scale testing?
10
When do you use the think aloud technique?
When you need to get a users mental model in the process of performing a task
Time is not being measured
