Abstract
We explore herein the role of time and errors as usability measures in real-life usability for older people and ICT, drawing on observation and conversational data collected over a 3-year ethnographic study of the usability and accessibility of ICT for older people. The results show that time has little or no practical value in real-life usability, except for expected complains about slower PCs and Internet connections, unlike making the least number of errors. This finding is independent of educational levels and previous experience with ICT, and grounded in three factors: (i) desire of independency, (ii) extra efforts to overcome mistakes; (iii) using computers as a hobby.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Blomberg, J., Burrell, M., Guest, G.: An ethnographic Approach to Design. In: Jacko, J.A., Sears, A. (eds.) The Human-Computer Interaction Handbook: Fundamentals, Evolving Technologies and Emerging Applications, pp. 964–987. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, London (2003)
Eisma, R., Dickinson, A., Goodman, J., Syme, A., Tiwari, L., Newell, A.F.: Early user involvement in the development of information technology-related products for older people. Universal Access in the Information Society 3, 131–140 (2004)
Hornbaek, K.: Current practice in measuring usability: Challenges to usability studies and research. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 64, 79–102 (2006)
Karat, J.: Beyond Task Completion: Evaluation of Affective Components of Use. In: Jacko, J.A., Sears, A. (eds.) The Human-Computer Interaction Handbook: Fundamentals, Evolving Technologies and Emerging Applications, pp. 1152–1163. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, London (2003)
Nielsen, J.: Usability Engineering. Academic Press, Boston (1993)
Selwyn, N.: The information aged: A qualitative study of older adults’ use of information and communications technology. Journal of Aging Studies 18, 369–384 (2004)
Thomas, P., Macredie, R.D.: Introduction to The New Usability. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction 9(2), 69–73 (2002)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Sayago, S., Blat, J. (2008). Exploring the Role of Time and Errors in Real-Life Usability for Older People and ICT. In: Miesenberger, K., Klaus, J., Zagler, W., Karshmer, A. (eds) Computers Helping People with Special Needs. ICCHP 2008. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5105. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-70540-6_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-70540-6_6
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-70539-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-70540-6
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)