Developing Elements of User Experience for Mobile Phones and ...

Developing Elements of User Experience for Mobile Phones and Services: Survey, Interview, and Observation Approaches Jaehyun Park, Sung H. Han, Hyun K. Kim, Youngseok Cho, and Wonkyu Park Department of Industrial and Management Engineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), San 31, Hyoja, Pohang 790-784, Republic of Korea

Abstract The term user experience (UX) encompasses the concepts of usability and affective engineering. However, UX has not been defined clearly. In this study, a literature survey, user interview and indirect observation were conducted to develop definitions of UX and its elements. A literature survey investigated 127 articles that were considered to be helpful to define the concept of UX. An in-depth interview targeted 14 hands-on workers in the Korean mobile phone industry. An indirect observation captured daily experiences of eight end-users with mobile phones. This study collected various views on UX from academia, industry, and end-users using these three approaches. As a result, this article proposes definitions of UX and its elements: usability, affect, and user value. These results are expected to help design products or services with greater levels of UX. C 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Keywords: User experience; Survey; In-depth interview; Indirect observation; Mobile phones and services

1. INTRODUCTION User experience (UX) broadly describes all aspects of interactions between a user and a product (Alben, 1996; Arhippainen & Tähti, 2003; Forlizzi & Ford, 2000; Kuniavsky, 2007; Marcus, 2006; McNamara & Kirakowski, 2006). The concept of UX covers affect or usability engineering (Alben, 1996; Hassenzahl & Roto, 2007). However, “UX” has not been defined clearly (Law et al., 2008; Law & Van Schaik, 2010). UX concepts Correspondence to: Sung H. Han, Department of Industrial and Management Engineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), San 31, Hyoja, Pohang 790-784, Republic of Korea. Phone: 82-54-279-2203; e-mail: [email protected]. This article was published online on 20 October 2011. An error was subsequently identified. This notice is included in the online and print versions to indicate that both have been corrected 13 June 2013. View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/hfm DOI: 10.1002/hfm.20316

vary in terms of scope, objects, or elements considered. One concept focuses on temporality perspective of UX (Karapanos, Zimmerman, Forlizzi, & Martens, 2009; Mäkelä & Fulton Suri, 2001). Another focuses on co-experience by considering the social aspects of UX (Battarbee, 2003). Furthermore, academic researchers and product developers apparently have different opinions of what UX means (Väa¨ nänen-Vainio-Mattila, Roto, & Hassenzahl, 2008). Attempts have been made to obtain a universal definition of UX. Hassenzahl and Tractinsky (2006) divided UX studies into three perspectives (beyond the instrumental, emotion and affect, and experiential), and finally defined UX as an outcome reflecting the user’s internal state, the system’s characteristics, and the context of use. Law, Roto, Hassenzahl, Vermeeren, and Kort (2009) conducted a survey to collect views of UX researchers and practitioners from academia and industry, and proposed UX as something individual that emerges from interacting with a product, system, service, or object. These studies may successfully

Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing & Service Industries 23 (4) 279–293 (2013)

c 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

279

User Experience Elements

derive UX definitions, which most researchers somewhat agree with, but they do not report what factors contribute to UX. Elements or factors that contribute to UX have rarely been systematically addressed in UX research. This study attempts to identity factors that may directly influence UX. This objective was achieved by a combination of literature survey, in-depth interview, and indirect observation. The literature survey mainly reflects views of academia researchers on UX. In-depth interviews with practitioners reveal the perspective of developers of mobile phones or services, who must meet the requirements of users. The indirect observation with end-users helps to understand behaviors of real users. Finally, perspectives on UX from these sources were used to define elements and subelements of UX. The literature survey comprehensively covered major works about UX, while the in-depth interview and indirect observation were each supplementary work to reveal any new ideas that were not mentioned or covered in the literature. For that reason, a relatively small number of interviewees and users participated in this study. UX was investigated for mobile phones and services in this study. We had several reasons for this choice. First, numerous previous UX studies have been conducted for these products and services (Arhippainen & Tähti, 2003; Hiltunen, Laukka, & Luomala, 2002; Roto, 2006). In addition, most corporations in the Korean mobile industry have established UX departments or groups. Thus, their employees are used to improving UX of their products or services. Moreover, mobile phones and services have come into wide use so that a person who does not have a mobile phone is rare. Accordingly, finding participants who are mobile phone users is easy.

2. LITERATURE SURVEY A literature survey consisted of three phases: (a) collecting, (b) screening, and (c) analyzing. A total of 247 articles were collected using keywords: user experience (UX), usability, human-computer interaction (HCI), user interface (UI), ease of use, usefulness, affective engineering, context of use, product/customer life cycle, user centered design (UCD), customer value added, technology acceptance model (TAM), and brand equity. Of these, 127 articles were selected, which were considered relevant to definitions and elements of UX. At this time, articles that did not include the keyword 280

Park, Han, Kim, et al.

“UX” directly but were considered to be valuable and helpful to construct UX concept were also collected.

2.1. Basic Statistics Basic statistics of the studies on UX were analyzed in terms of sources, regions, research types, and publication years (Figure 1). Most of the articles were proceedings (56) and journal papers (49); nine were from magazines, six from books, four from reports, and three from dissertations. The proceedings were mainly from the ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) and the International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (HCII); 17 and 10 articles were from each conference, respectively. Most of the collected studies were conducted in North America (56) or Europe (47). Studies conducted in North America have various keywords such as traditional usability, UCD, TAM, or brand equity. In contrast, European studies frequently mention the term UX. Most UX studies were conducted at universities (81 articles). For example, University of Art and Design Helsinki (UIAH), University of Oulu, and Delft University of Technology have each published five articles. The number of papers published by companies (25) is the second highest. Among them, Nokia (9) and IBM (6) accounted for the majority. Cooperation between universities and companies (16 articles) was the third most common source of UX research. Research on UX conceptualization increased drastically after 2005 (Figure 1, bottom). Most articles published before 2005 focused on usability, UCD, or TAM instead of on UX. Authors’ backgrounds were also analyzed, using information given in the articles. The backgrounds were divided into six categories: (a) human factors, (b) design, (c) computer science, (d) psychology, (e) information systems, and (f) business (Table 1). Most research in the psychology domain concerned TAM, whereas most in the business domain concerned brand equity.

2.2. UX Definitions in Relevant Studies A variety of researchers have conducted studies to define UX. Karapanos et al. (2009) focused on temporality, that is, UX might vary over time. According to the study, early experiences tend to relate to hedonic aspects of a product use, but prolonged experiences may be associated with subjective aspects,

Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing & Service Industries

DOI: 10.1002/hfm



Reports (4) Books (6) Magazines (9)

Others (13) Proc. (56) Asia (11)

Dissertations (3)

University & Others (5) Company (16)

North America (56)

Company (25)

Europe (47)

Journals (49)

University (81)

Sources

Regions

Research types

25 22 19

20

18

15 11

11

11

11

10 6

7

6

5

5

0 Before 2000

Figure 1

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

Publication year

Basic statistics of user experience literatures (frequency means number of articles).

such as how a product is meaningful and significant in one’s life. Desmet and Hekkert (2007) introduced a framework for product experience, including three distinct components: (a) aesthetic experience, (b) experience of meaning, and (c) emotional experience. Prior to this, Hekkert (2006, p. 160) defined product experience as “the entire set of affects elicited by the interaction between the user and a product, including the degree to which all our senses are gratified (aesthetic experience), the meanings we attach to the product (experience of meaning) and the feelings and emotions that are elicited (emotional experience).” Hassenzahl and Tractinsky (2006) defined UX to be a consequence TABLE 1. Domains of the Authors Domain

Persons

Human factors (e.g., HCI, industrial engineering) Design (e.g., industrial design, interface design) Computer science (e.g., software engineering) Psychology (e.g., cognitive psychology) Information systems (e.g., quality engineering) Business (e.g., marketing, business management) Others Total

47 39 34 25 38 51 6 240

of the user’s internal state (e.g., predispositions and expectations), the characteristics of the designed system (e.g., complexity and usability), and the context within which the interaction occurs (e.g., organizational/social setting). Marcus (2006) stated that UX design includes an enlarged scope of objectives for products and services. According to him, experience covers all stakeholder touch-points, such as the places where a buyer, a customer, a staff member, a journalist, or an investor comes into contact with the product or service, or its sponsoring company or organization. Rust et al. (2004) recommended that corporate managers should focus on customer equity, which is the sum of the lifetime values of the firm’s customers. The customer equity is influenced by value equity (e.g., price, and convenience of the offering), brand equity and relationship equity (e.g., friendship with salespeople). Arhippainen and Tähti (2003) emphasized the particular context of use that social and cultural factors influence. For example, social factors include time pressure, explicit, and implicit requirements, whereas cultural factors include gender, fashion, and habits. Mäkelä and Fulton Suri (2001) regarded present experience to be a result of a motivated action in a certain context. The user’s previous experiences and expectations affect the present experience, which leads to more


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

281



experiences and modified expectations. Besides, many articles have derived definitions of UX with simple phrases such as “all aspects of users’ interaction with a product” (Alben, 1996; Kuniavsky, 2007; Marcus, 2006; McNamara & Kirakowski, 2006).

2.3. Defining UX Experience can be categorized into the previous, the present, and the future experience in chronological order. Because the user’s previous experiences influence the present experience, which leads in turn to more experiences in the future (Mäkelä & Fulton Suri, 2001), UX analysis can focus on the present experience. Another approach is to investigate UX in terms of an object

with which the user interacts. Experience, brand experience, or product experience may be alternatives to UX. Product experience belongs to brand experience in a broad sense, and brand experience can be regarded as one type of experience (Law et al., 2009). However, many studies conducted to define UX suggested that UX might be generated when the user interacts with a product. Table 2 shows UX definitions reported in relevant studies. The scope of UX is discussed in detail in Section 5. As the results of the literature survey, this study sets bounds to UX as product experience. In addition, most researchers mentioned that abstract and subjective values of users such as emotional attachment can be another facet of UX, instead of existing concepts such as usability or affect (Karapanos et al., 2009;

TABLE 2. User Experience (UX) Definitions Reported in Relevant Studies

Reference Alben (1996) Arhippainen and Tahti (2003) ¨ Battarbee (2003) Desmet and Hekkert (2007) Forlizzi and Ford (2000)

Keyword Quality of experience UX

Objects That the User Interacts With

Emphasis on Temporality

Products

X

Products

X

Co-experience Products, other users Product Products experience UX Products (including services)

X

UX

Designed systems

X

UX

Products

O

UX

X

Makel ¨ a¨ and Fulton Suri (2001) McNamara and Kirakowski (2006) Marcus (2006)

UX

Products (including services, systems), organizations Products

O

UX

Products

X

UX

Products, services, companies/organizations Products, services, companies

X

Nielsen Norman Group (online) Roto (2006) Rust et al. (2004)

UX UX Customer equity

System (products, objects, services, people, infrastructure) Brand (including products, services)

Introducing social factors, cultural factors, context of use Introducing co-experience Considering experience of meaning

X X

Hassenzahl and Tractinsky (2006) Karapanos et al. (2009) Kuniavsky (2007)

Notes About UX Concept

Developing a framework, including cognition, subconsciousness, narrative, and storytelling experience

Regarding functionality, usability, and UX as independent aspect of usage Regarding cultural model as important

X 1 2

Based on brand equity perspective

Notes: 1 : Temporal context refers to the period that the user can dedicate for the system given the context restrictions. 2 : Customer lifetime refers to the time during which the customer has a relationship with the company. [Corrections were made in body of table after initial online publication.]

282


DOI: 10.1002/hfm



McNamara & Kirakowski, 2006). Moreover, temporality, which means that UX may vary over passage of time, can be an important component of UX.

ion about the first hypothesis, “service experience as well as product experience belongs to UX,” he or she was also asked questions about his or her own definitions of product experience and service experience.

3. IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW 3.1. Organization

3.2. Backgrounds of Participants

An in-depth interview was conducted to target handson workers in the Korean mobile phone industry. Academic UX research tends to focus on UX theories and frameworks, whereas the industrial UX development seems more likely to emphasize practical attributes, such as functionality (Väa¨ nänen-Vainio-Mattila et al., 2008). An in-depth interview of hands-on workers might help to bridge the gap between how the research community and the product developers perceive the UX concept. The interview includes 12 questions related to definitions, scopes, and elements of UX (Table 3). The interview questions were revised from publications using survey or interview approaches (Law et al., 2009; Marcus, Ashley, Knapheide, Lund, Rosenberg, & Vredenburg, 2009). Each interviewee was asked to indicate the degree of agreement to hypotheses on a 1–5 scale (1: totally disagree, 2: partly disagree, 3: neither agree nor disagree, 4: partly agree, 5: totally agree). The interviewee was asked to give reasons why he or she provided each opinion and to explain his or her own definition about related concepts. For example, when the interviewee was asked to provide their opin-

Fourteen hands-on workers participated in the indepth interview. The interviewees worked for eight different companies, including those involved in cellphone manufacturing (Samsung, LG and Motorola Korea), mobile telecommunication (SK Telecom, KT and LG Telecom), and internet service (NHN and Daum). The interviewees consisted of user interface (UI) designers, UX designers, system or software developers, and managers of UI/UX departments. Each had been employed in the position for an average of 6 years. Their backgrounds included industrial engineering (6 persons), design (4 persons), computer science (1 person), and cognitive engineering (1 person). Three interviewees had doctorates, nine had master’s degrees, and two had bachelor’s degrees.

3.3. Findings About UX Interview results were analyzed in terms of service and brand experience and UX elements. The analysis was conducted based on average scores and interviewees’ comments. If the average score is close to 1 or 5, most interviewees are likely to strongly disagree or agree on

TABLE 3. Interview Questions and Quantified Results Interview Questions (11 hypotheses and 1 open-ended question) UX definitions and scopes (Q1) Q1-1. Service experience as well as product experience belongs to UX Q1-2. The user can gain UX without interacting with a product Q1-3. A nonprofit product brings UX Q1-4. UX occurs because of the user’s relationship with a corporation Q1-5. UX exists before the actual use of a product Q1-6. Promotional activities before a product launch bring UX UX elements (Q2) Q2-1. Usability of a product and user’s affect influence UX Q2-2. The user’s subjective value toward a product influences UX Q2-3. Information given by other users influences UX Q2-4. Previous experience with similar products influences UX Q2-5. Culture background of the user influences UX Q2-6. The three most important factors influencing UX (open-ended)

Avg.

Std.

95 CI

4.79 3.21 4.86 4.21 4.14 3.79

0.43 1.42 0.36 0.89 1.03 1.37

4.56–5 2.47–3.96 4.67–5 3.75–4.68 3.60–4.68 3.07–4.50

4.79 4.50 3.93 4.79 4.86 —

0.43 0.65 1.00 0.43 0.36 —

4.56–5 4.16–4.84 3.41–4.45 4.56–5 4.67–5 —

Notes: ∗ Avg., Std., and 95 CI mean average, standard deviation, and 95% confidence interval.


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

283


the hypothesis, respectively. However, comments reported by the interviewees were considered more important because interpretations of the average scores did not have enough statistical evidence. The results showed that most ideas of the UX concept developed by the literature survey were confirmed by the detailed comments. First, most interviewees believed that service as well as product experience are components of UX. Second, UX seems to occur by user’s interactions with a corporation. However, most interviewees stated that a product or service mediates that relationship. This fact supports the hypothesis that UX should be bounded by product or service experience. Third, they considered that usability, affect, user’s subjective value, and previous experience are important. They were asked to select three important factors affecting UX (open-ended question Q2-6). Among them, 12 of 14 interviewees selected usability, 10 selected affect, 8 selected user’s subjective value, and 8 selected previous experience. As confirmed by the interview results, this study proposed usability, affect, and user’s subjective value as main elements of UX, and user’s subjective value is termed user value in the remaining section. Previous experience is regarded to be outside the scope of UX elements, because it may be related to measurement of UX.

4. INDIRECT OBSERVATION 4.1. Method for Capturing Experiences The aim of this indirect observation was to collect mobile phone users’ behaviors and understand what constitutes their experiences. Many observation approaches to capture experiences of the user have been introduced so that a product can be best designed early in the product development life cycle. Even though this study does not aim to design a product or service, the observation seems to be appropriate to gain understanding of the daily experiences of users. Observation approaches are helpful to catch thoughts and feelings that participants would probably not have in a controlled experiment. Beyer and Holtzblatt (1998) introduced an organized process of contextual inquiry consisting of one-onone observations and interviews. The experience sampling method (ESM) has also been widely used. In this approach, participants are asked to stop at random times and make notes of their experience in real 284


time (Hektner, Schmidt, & Csikszentmihalyi, 2007; Larson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1983). In addition, log files can be used to understand how users are experiencing products or services (Kuniavsky, 2003). However, these approaches involve a high level of experimenters’ or participants’ burden, or are expensive. For these reasons, Karapanos et al. (2009) used the day reconstruction method (DRM) to investigate rich qualitative experiences of users and to articulate the UX concept with several narrative terms. The DRM let participants record their daily experiences once before going to sleep (Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, & Stone, 2004). In contrast, Swallow et al. (2005) used the voice recording to capture mobile phone usage and developed several dimensions explaining UX. But this method has a drawback: It requires voice recorders, which make an experiment costly.

4.2. Experimental Design An indirect observation using DRM was conducted to capture users’ behavior patterns, feelings, thoughts, and episodes when the users interacted with their mobile phones. However, in a small pilot test using DRM, we found that the users may feel burdened when they recall mobile phone use accurately. Because they use their mobile phones frequently, recalling all daily experiences at one time can be difficult. Thus, this study used a hybrid approach based on DRM. All participants were asked to record their experiences three times per day. Whenever they wrote about their experiences, they were asked to write a series of episodes. Each episode included a brief name of the episode, place, time, affair, and participant’s feelings elicited by their experience. The observation was conducted over 7 days for each participant, because this period is long enough to capture their experiences (Kuniavsky, 2003).

4.3. Participants To collect a variety of experience that is as wide as possible, eight different user types were defined before recruiting participants. First, characteristics of mobile phone users were developed based on social, cultural, and contextual factors that were considered to influence UX. User characteristics included age, gender, region, occupation, period of ownership, previous experiences with other brands of phones, and the type of mobile phones that the user owned at the time


DOI: 10.1002/hfm



(e.g., bar type and folder type). Second, primary user characteristics were selected by referring to a severity rating by HCI specialists. For example, period of ownership was regarded as a primary characteristic, because it is related to customer life cycle (CLC). According to Karapanos et al. (2009), UX changes over time after the purchase of a product. Occupation and gender were also considered as primary factors in this step. Third, eight user types were developed by considering combinations of primary user characteristics (i.e., period of ownership, occupation, and gender). Taking into account that the average life cycle of Korean mobile phone is about 1.5 years, the period of ownership factor was classified into two categories: within a week after purchase (short term UX) and 6 to 12 months after purchase (long-term UX). Occupation was categorized into two groups: student (e.g., high school and university student) and nonstudent (e.g., office worker). Students usually do not have economic power that can differentiate users’ behavior patterns such as the use of wireless data communication. For example, in Korea, people who are in a low-income group cannot use the mobile internet frequently with their mobile phones, because the pricing scheme used for mobile internet is usually a meter-rate system based on the amount of data (Ahn, Lee, Lee, & Kim, 2006). This study did not consider the types of mobile phones that the participants own, because the focus of the experiment was to extract a variety of experiences. Eight users participated in the indirect observation. They were recruited using the personal database methods (Kuniavsky, 2003) so that each user represents one of eight user types. This recruiting method can help participants to feel a sense of trust and collaboration with researchers. This feeling is important in a self-observation study, because participants share information about their daily lives with researchers (Hektner et al., 2007). The participants averaged 24.5 years old with a standard deviation of 3.25 years. Four were male and four were female. Four were students, three were office workers, and one was a housekeeper. Three of them used full-touch phones, two used foldertype phones, two used slide-type phones, and one used an unspecified type of phone. The participants were assumed to have equal ability to recall important events. Participants’ usages, perceptions, and behaviors were also assumed not to be affected by their earlier reports.

4.4. Identifying Subelements of UX UX is an ambiguous and abstract construct. Nevertheless, it can be decomposed into a hierarchical structure consisting of more concrete attributes (i.e., elements and subelements). Usability, affect, and user value were identified as three elements influencing UX as stated earlier. Subelements, which mean attributes of each element, were identified by analyzing the results of the literature survey and augmented by the observation study. Although plentiful studies have identified subelements for usability and affect (Han & Hong, 2003; Han et al., 2000), a few studies investigated subelements for user value from the user’s standpoint. Thus, this study focused on identifying the subelements of user value. The identifying process consisted of three steps: (a) developing an initial list, (b) mapping episodes on the list, and (c) revising the list. First, an initial subelement list was developed by referring to relevant studies. For example, feelings of confidence, achievement, and friendship may be candidates for user value (Savas, 2004). In this step, an initial list, including 21 subelement candidates was developed: customer need, eagerness, fun, usefulness, expectation, attachment, identity, independence, confidence, novelty, relaxation, jealousy, challenge, sociability, control, security, trust, loyalty, addiction, cost, and customizability. Candidates that were not relevant to user value or that could be merged in to other candidates were eliminated from the initial list. Then, all episodes collected from the indirect observation were assigned to one or more of the candidates in the list. A total of 216 episodes were collected from the eight participants during the 7-day period. For example, the following episode, which was written by a female high school student, can be matched to “challenge.” The title of episode:Sending SMS (Short Message Service) Beginning and end of time:5:05 am to 6:20 am Place:In the subway Affair:We, I and my old friend, texted each other for nothing important. Feelings related to this affair (including reasons for the feeling):When I just purchased this mobile phone, it was very inconvenient to text. So it was really slow. But, now, I can text fast. It makes me feel good and happy. I seem to be texting nonstop these days. I’d better get improving my SMS skill a little more.


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

285


(Author’s comment: In Korea, several methods are used to input the Korean alphabet on mobile devices. The methods depend on manufacturer, and differ from each other in many ways. Accordingly, users who are accustomed to a certain method for inputting the Korean alphabet often have trouble when first using another method.) If no candidate matches a certain episode, a new concept would be generated in the third step. Four concepts such as preciousness, possessiveness, fullness, and killing time were added to the candidate list. Quantitative analysis, such as counting frequencies, was not conducted, because results of the indirect observation itself were considered supplementary data to augment the initial subelement list. Finally, the candidates were classified into five subelements (i.e., self-satisfaction, pleasure, sociability, customer need, and attachment), by considering causal or dominant/subordinate relationships among the candidates.

5. CONCEPTUALIZATION OF UX 5.1. Definition of UX UX and its elements were defined, based on the results of the literature survey, in-depth interview, and indirect observation. Experience is everything that happens to us, from which we may obtain knowledge, feelings, and skills. Forlizzi and Ford (2000) introduced “experience,” “an experience,” and “experience as story.” First, “experience” is the constant stream that happens during moments of consciousness. Second, “an experience” has a beginning and an end, and as a result changes the user, and sometimes, the context of the experience. Third, “experience as story” represents narratives that we use to condense and remember experiences and to communicate them in a variety of situations to certain audiences. Forlizzi and Battarbee (2004) also proposed a concept of “co-experience,” which creates meaning and emotion with other people through product use. At any case, experience includes all our routine activities, such as face-to-face relations and religious activities, as well as brand, product, or service experiences. Brand experience is one type of experience, which is a consequence of interactions between the user and a certain brand. Brand experience includes interactions with the corporation as well as with its branded products and services (Law et al., 2009). In fact, “brand” is a broad and ambiguous concept. Farquhar, Han, 286


Herr, and Ijiri (1992) classified brand hierarchically into three groups: (a) corporate brand, (b) family brand, and (c) individual brand. Corporate brand uses a company’s name as a brand name (e.g., Apple and Samsung). Family brand, also called umbrella brand, involves several related products or services under one brand name, while individual brand gives each product or service a unique name. Factors that influence brand experience may be brand loyalty, brand awareness, attitude to brand, brand ethics, and experiences with products or services (Aaker, 1997; Keller & Lehmann, 2006; Krishnan & Hartline, 2001; Yoo & Donthu, 2001). UX can be defined as an overarching experience that consists of all aspects of users’ interaction with a product or service (Alben, 1996; Arhippainen & Tähti, 2003; Forlizzi & Ford, 2000; Kuniavsky, 2007; Marcus, 2006; McNamara & Kirakowski, 2006). Results of the indepth interview (hypothesis Q1-1) of this study and Roto (2006) support the supposition that the user can gain UX when he or she uses a certain service as well as a product. In other words, UX means product or service experience that composes brand experience (Figure 2). Thus, this study limited the scope of UX to the product or service experience. The following sections show elements of UX: usability, affect, and user value.

5.2. Elements of UX Elements of UX are factors that influence UX significantly. This study suggests that usability, affect, and user value are elements of UX. Usability and affect have been widely studied since before the introduction of the concept of UX. The TAM theory included “ease of use.” For example, Davis (1989) suggested that perceived ease of use might actually be a causal antecedent to perceived usefulness. Nagamachi (1995) introduced Kansei engineering, which has the goal of implementing customers’ feelings and demands into product function and design. In contrast, Han et al. (2001) defined usability as the degree to which users are satisfied with a product with respect to both its performance and its image and impression. Han et al. (2004) developed relationship models between product design and user satisfaction in terms of affective engineering. However, the concept of UX is known to be more extensive than simply usability or affect. Elements of UX should cover extensive situations, and not be just a “buzzword.” Therefore, the incorporation of user value differentiates our proposition from existing


DOI: 10.1002/hfm



Figure 2

User experience concept proposed in this study.

definitions of UX. Moreover, we propose subelements and their definition of each UX element.

5.2.1. Usability Usability was originally defined as the efficiency and effectiveness of the user interface (Hix & Hartson, 1993), or the effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction with which specified users can achieve specified goals in particular environments (ISO 9241-11). Cakir (2000) tried to improve usability of an everyday product using ISO definition. In addition, relatively recent studies about usability attempted to expand the theory of usability so that the concept might include hedonic qualities as well as pragmatic qualities. For example, Kwahk and Han (2002) included image and impression values for a usability concept. However, the present study focuses mainly on performance aspects of a product or service for the usability concept (Table 4). Usability dimensions have been widely studied by various researchers, since usability was first defined by Bennet (1984) and Shackel (1984). Although ISO (1993) defined three major dimensions, including (a) effectiveness, (b) efficiency, and (c) satisfaction, other dimensions, such as simplicity and learnability, were also used to evaluate usability. For example, Han et al.

(2001) suggested performance dimensions of usability could be classified into three categories: (a) perception/cognition, (b) learning/memorization, and (c) control/action. Strawderman and Koubek (2008) considered five usability dimensions to match service quality dimensions. Jin, Ji, Choi, and Cho (2009) also developed more than 20 usability dimensions to evaluate dishwashers, including consistency, familiarity, and feedback. In this study, approximately 30 dimensions related to usability were collected from the literature. Seven subelements of usability were then determined through integration and screening processes. Dimensions related to subjective satisfaction were excluded from usability subelements, because these dimensions are considered as affect or user value subelements.

5.2.2. Affect Russel (2003, p. 148) defined core affect as “a neurophysiological state consciously accessible as the simplest non-reflective feelings evident in moods and emotions.” However, this concept may not be applicable to UX, because core affect does not focus on an object that the user interacts with. Accordingly, in this study, affect is considered as an emotion that is a consequence of interaction with a product or service (Table 5).


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

287



TABLE 4. Definitions of Sublements of Usability Subelement∗ Simplicity Modelessness Directness Accessibility User control Efficiency Effectiveness Effortlessness Informativeness Comprehensiveness Explicitness Visibility Legibility/readability Flexibility Adaptability Interoperability Learnability Memorability Familiarity Predictability Intuitiveness Consistency User support Easy installation Error prevention Forgiveness Feedback Helpfulness

Definition way a product/service looks and works is simple, plain, and uncomplicated Capability that allows the user to do whatever they want when necessary (e.g., easy to change a mode of product or service) Degree of user’s perception of directly controlling the user interface of a product/service Degree to which a product/service is easy to approach or operate Ability for the user to regulate, control, and operate the user interface of a product/service Degree to which a product/service enables a task successfully without wasting time or energy Accuracy and completeness with which specified users achieved specified goals in particular environment Ability of a product/service to require or involve no effort of the user Degree to which a product/service is instructive and gives all the necessary information to the user in a proper manner Degree to which a product/service covers or includes extensive information that is needed or relevant to the user User’s perception that the way a product/service looks and works is clear and accurate Degree of user’s perception of clearly seeing objects on the user interface of a product/service Degree of user’s perception of reading or understanding a word, line, or paragraph written in the user interface of a product/service Extent to which a product/service can accommodate changes to tasks and environments beyond those first specified Degree to which a product/service is changed easily to fit different users and/or conditions Ability of two or more product/services are used or operated reciprocally Time and effort required for the user to learn how to use a product/service Degree to which a product/service is easy to remember Extent to which the user’s knowledge and experience in other domains or real world can be applied to interacting with a new product/service Ability for the user to expect the effect of future actions based on past interaction experiences Degree of user’s perception of understanding the way a product/service looks and works by intuition Similarity in the way a product/service looks and works and the input/output behavior arising from similar situations or tasks Ability for the user to operate a product/service easily through its entire life cycle Ability for the user to install or initiate a new product/service easily Ability to help the user preventing errors and taking corrective actions once an error has been recognized Ability for the user to cancel or undo their tasks on the assumption that the user may make a mistake Degree of presenting feedback information for the user input User’s perception that a product/service communicates in a helpful way

Note: ∗ The indented words mean components of each subelement outdented above.

Affect research on products has widely been conducted. Picard (1995) applied the affect concept to computers. Hong (2005) reported that affective satisfaction is influenced by product appearances and investigated affective satisfaction toward mobile phones. Desmet and Hekkert (2007) suggested the concept of aesthetic experience considering a product’s capacity to delight one or more of our sensory modalities. Horn and Salvendy 288

(2009) indicated that affect is significantly related to willingness to purchase consumer products. Subelements of affect consist of affective words represent customer’s feeling. To develop these affective words, surveys have widely been conducted to investigate how people express their feelings, thoughts, or impressions (Nagamachi, 1995; Han et al., 2000). Various studies have developed affective words, which are


DOI: 10.1002/hfm



TABLE 5. Definitions of Subelements of Affect Sub-element

Definition

Delicacy Simplicity Texture Luxuriousness Color Attractiveness

Degree to which a product/service is elaborate, or finely and skillfully made The way a product/service looks and works is simple, plain, and uncomplicated Degree to which a product’s texture or touch appeals to the users Degree to which a product/service is luxurious or looks superior in quality and expense Degree to which the color used in a product/service is likable, vivid, or colorful User’s perception that a product/service is pleasing, arousing, interest, and attractive

TABLE 6. Definitions of Subelements of User Value Sub-elements∗

Definition

Self-satisfaction

Degree to which a product/service gives the user satisfaction with himself or herself or achievements User’s perception of being the distinct personality of an individual (related terms: personality, self-expression, unique) User’s perception of achieving something new and difficult which requires great effort and determination (Related terms: Achievement) Belief in oneself and one’s abilities reflected by a product/service (related terms: pride, fullness) User’s feeling of being pleased or gratified by interacting with a product/service Degree to which a product/service gives the user enjoyment, amusement, or pleasure Degree to which a product/service provides the user new vigor and energy Degree to which a product/service satisfies the user’s desire of being sociable Degree to which a product/service set the stage where the user can feel, express, or share their emotions socially Degree to which a product/service provides the user values related to social issues, problems, and reforms User’s perception of having a friendly relation with other people Degree to which functions or appearances of a product/service satisfy the user’s needs User’s perception of having keen interest or intense desire User’s act or state of looking forward or anticipating Degree to which a product/service has a beneficial, practical use Degree to which a product/service is changed or built easily to fit personal specifications or preferences Ability for the user to attach subjective value to a product/service Degree to which a product/service is novel, new, or unique (related term: curiosity) Degree to which a product/service is valuable, precious to the user Degree to which a product/service deserves of trust or confidence (related terms: belief, trust)

Identity Challenge Confidence Pleasure Fun Refresh Sociability Social emotion Social value Friendship Customer need Eagerness Expectation Usefulness/Utility Customizability Attachment Novelty Preciousness Trustworthiness

Note: ∗ The indented words mean components of each subelement outdented above.

expected to vary over product or service. In this study, six subelements were identified by revising dimensions, which were suggested by Hong (2005). 5.2.3. User Value User value is a subjective value that the user attaches to a product (Table 6). The value may be related to how the

user thinks the product is meaningful and significant in his or her life. This element of UX is correlated with symbolic association proposed by Crilly, Moultrie, and Clarkson (2004). According to the study, symbolic association is determined by what the product is seen to symbolize about its user, or the social-cultural context of use. For example, while a chair affords sitting, a throne implies status and power. Clearly, individual


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

289


and cultural differences influence this cognitive context (Desmet & Hekkert, 2007). In fact, the values, such as fun or usefulness, were regarded as important before the emergence of the concept of UX. Igbaria, Schiffman, and Wieckowski (1994) proposed perceived fun might be important as much as perceived usefulness. Kahle (1983) retrieved “list of value,” which affect users’ purchasing behavior: sense of belonging, selffulfillment, fun and enjoyment in life, warm relationships with others, being well-respected, excitement, sense of accomplishment, security, and self-respect. Although many studies were concerned about fun, pleasure, or subjective value, a few attempted to identify elements of user value. In this study, the initial subelement list from the literature survey was augmented by analyzing episodes of the indirect observation. Then, five subelements of user value were proposed using a merging process (Section 4.4).

6. DISCUSSION ON THE UX CONCEPT UX can be defined as an overarching experience that consists of all aspects of users’ interaction with a product or service. All existing theories about UCD, usability, affect engineering, and TAM are applicable to UX. Moreover, even brand equity may also influence UX (Arhippainen & Tähti, 2003). For that reason, gathering various views and specifying the scope of UX is important. With our survey, interview, and observation, this study regards UX as product or service experience. This study concludes that brand experience, not mediated by products or services, does not affect UX. For example, a corporate advertisement to enhance its image can affect users and give users a kind of experience, but it may not contribute to UX. We can call it just “brand experience.” Of course, many kinds of service experience contribute to UX, including product experience, even if service may be conducted without physical interfaces. However, the shapes or characteristics of user interfaces vary, sometimes drastically, in different products or services. Thus, influential factors may differ among services or products. Usability, affect, and user value, which are proposed as important elements for UX of mobile phones and services, may not be main factors in other types of products. For example, for UX of automobiles, safety, and fuel efficiency can be more

290


important factors than usability or affect. Bahn, Lee, Nam, and Yun (2009) developed material, elasticity, harmony, shape, and color as influential factors to evaluate a car crash pad. At a glance, those are quite different from elements and subelements of UX for mobile phones and services. In other words, the UX elements and their subelements developed in this study can only be applicable to evaluate mobile phones and services. A prototype implemented in the process of developing a new mobile product or service can be evaluated by investigating how latent customers can be satisfied in terms of UX elements. Of course, the UX concept cannot account for every phenomenon, but it gives us more information that was not reported by existing theories, including affect and usability engineering. In addition, among the UX elements or subelements, correlation or causation can exist. First, they are not expected to be mutually exclusive of each other. The relationship among the constructs highly relies on how they would be defined. Picard (1995) considered pleasure and joy, which are classified into user value in this study, as an affective state. Besides, Han et al. (2001) included image or impression as well as performance in “usability.”. In this way, although correlations among constructs were not investigated systematically, elements of UX can be correlated. For instance, simplicity belongs to both “usability” and “affect” in this study. Second, UX elements and subelements may have cause-effect relationships. The Rokeach Value Survey (RVS) defined terminal values as desirable end-states of existence, which included friendship, mature love, self-respect, and happiness (Rokeach, 1973). Rokeach’s terminal values seem to be similar to “user value” defined in this study. We may naturally think that user value is a consequence of usability or affect. This causeeffect relation may be examined in future work.

7. CONCLUSION UX is concerned with experience that occurs when a user interacts with a product or service. Many researchers and practitioners agree that UX includes all aspects of users’ interaction, but experience without product or service should be excluded. Using a literature survey, in-depth interview, and indirect observation, which represent academia, industry, and end-user perspectives, respectively, this study developed three


DOI: 10.1002/hfm



main elements of UX (i.e., usability, affect, and user value) and their subelements. The literature survey played a key role in developing the elements, while the results of the interview and observation were used as supplementary tools to augment any new ideas to the initial concepts developed by the literature survey. Nevertheless, the in-depth interview has significantly contributed to confirm the elements of UX and to set bounds to UX. The indirect observation has played an important part to elicit subelements of user value. The proposed hierarchical structure of UX is expected to contribute to the process of designing mobile phones and services. In addition, more effort could also be dedicated to developing measurement methods for each element and subelement of UX. Afterward, the measured structure might be tested by various techniques such as confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in future studies.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT This work was supported by Mid-career Researcher Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MEST) (No. 20100000364). References Aaker, D. A. (1997). Should you take your brand to where the action is? Harvard Business Review, 75(5), 135–142. Ahn, J., Lee, J., Lee, J. D., & Kim, T. Y. (2006). An analysis of consumer preferences among wireless LAN and mobile internet services. ETRI Journal, 28(2), 205–214. Alben, L. (1996). Quality of experience: Defining the criteria for effective interaction design. Interactions, 3(3), 11–15. Arhippainen, L., & Tähti, M. (2003). Empirical evaluation of user experience in two adaptive mobile application prototypes. Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Multimedia (MUM 2003), Norrköping, Sweden, 27–34. Bahn, S., Lee, C., Nam, C. S., & Yun, M. H. (2009). Incorporating affective customer needs for luxuriousness into product design attributes. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing, 19(2), 105–127. Battarbee, K. (2003). Defining co-experience. Proceedings of the 2003 International Conference on Designing Pleasurable Products and Interfaces (DPPI 2003), Pittsburgh, PA, 109–113.

Bennet, J. (1984). Managing to meet usability requirements: Establishing and meeting software development goals. In J. Bennet, D. Case, J. Sandelin, & M. Smith (Eds.), Visual display terminals: Usability issues and Health Concerns. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: PrenticeHall. Beyer, H., & Holtzblatt, K. (1998). Contextual design: Defining customer-centered systems. San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann. Cakir, A. E. (2000). Improving the quality and usability of everyday products: A case for report systems. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing, 10(1), 3–21. Crilly, N., Moultrie, J., & Clarkson, P. J. (2004). Seeing things: Consumer response to the visual domain in product design. Design Studies, 25(6), 547–577. Davis, F. D. (1989). Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and user acceptance of information technology. MIS Quarterly: Management Information Systems, 13(3), 319–339. Desmet, P., & Hekkert, P. (2007). Framework of product experience. International Journal of Design, 1(1), 57– 66. Farquhar, P. H., Han, J. Y., Herr, P. M., & Ijiri, Y. (1992). Strategies for leveraging master brands: How to bypass the risks of direct extensions. Marketing Research, 4(3), 32–43. Forlizzi, J., & Battarbee, K. (2004). Understanding experience in interactive systems. Proceedings of Designing Interactive Systems (DIS 2004), Cambridge, MA, 261– 268. Forlizzi, J., & Ford, S. (2000). The building blocks of experience: an early framework for interaction designers. Proceedings of Designing Interactive Systems (DIS 2000), 419–423. Han, S. H., & Hong, S. W. (2003). A systematic approach for coupling user satisfaction with product design. Ergonomics, 46(13–14), 1441–1461. Han, S. H., Kim, K. J., Yun, M. H., Hong, S. W., & Kim, J. (2004). Identifying mobile phone design features critical to user satisfaction. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing, 14(1), 15–29. Han, S. H., Yun, M. H., Kim, K. J., & Kwahk, J. (2000). Evaluation of product usability: Development and validation of usability dimensions and design elements based on empirical models. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 26(4), 477–488. Han, S. H., Yun, M. H., Kwahk, J., & Hong, S. W. (2001). Usability of consumer electronic products. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 28(3–4), 143– 151. Hassenzahl, M., & Roto, V. (2007). Being and doing: A perspective on user experience and its measurement. Interfaces, 72.


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

291


Hassenzahl, M., & Tractinsky, N. (2006). User experience—a research agenda. Behaviour and Information Technology, 25(2), 91–97. Hekkert, P. (2006). Design aesthetics: Principles of pleasure in product design. Psychology Science, 48(2), 157– 172. Hektner, J. M., Schmidt, J. A., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2007). Experience sampling method: Measuring the quality of everyday Life. Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, CA. Hiltunen, M., Laukka, M., & Luomala, J. (2002). Mobile user experience. Finland: IT Press, Helsinki, Finland. Hix, D., & Hartson, H. R. (1993). Developing user interfaces: Ensuring usability through product and process. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Hong, S. W. (2005). A methodology for modelling and analyzing user’s affective satisfaction toward consumer electronic products. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), South Korea. Horn, D., & Salvendy, G. (2009). Measuring consumer perception of product creativity: Impact on satisfaction and purchasability. Human Factors and Ergonomics in manufacturing, 19(3), 223–240. Igbaria, M., Schiffman, S. J., & Wieckowski, T. J. (1994). The respective roles of perceived usefulness and perceived fun in the acceptance of microcomputer technology. Behaviour and Information Technology, 13(6), 349–361. ISO 9241-11. (1998). Ergonomic requirements for office work with visual display terminals (VDTs). Part 11: Guidance on usability. Jin, B. S., Ji, Y. G., Choi, K., & Cho, G. (2009). Development of a usability evaluation framework with quality function deployment: From customer sensibility to product design. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing, 19(2), 177–194. Kahle, L.R. (1983). Attitudes and social adaptation: a person–situation interaction approach. London: Pergamon Press. Kahneman, D., Krueger, A. B., Schkade, D. A., Schwarz, N., & Stone, A. A. (2004). A survey method for characterizing daily life experience: the day reconstruction method. Science, 306. 1776–1780. Karapanos, E., Zimmerman, J., Forlizzi, J., & Martens, J.B. (2009). User experience over time: An initial framework. Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2009), Boston, MA 729–738. Keller, K. L., & Lehmann, D. R. (2006). Brands and branding: Research findings and future priorities. Marketing Science, 25(6), 740–759.

292


Krishnan, B., & Hartline, M. D. (2001). Brand equity: Is it more important in services? Journal of Services Marketing, 15(5), 328–342. Kuniavsky, M. (2003). Observing the user experience: A practitioner’s guide to user research. San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann,. Kuniavsky, M. (2007). User experience and HCI. In A. Sears & J. A. Jacko (Eds.), The human-computer interaction handbook: Fundamentals, evolving technologies, and emerging applications (2nd ed.). New York: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Kwahk, J., & Han, S. H. (2002). A methodology for evaluating the usability of audiovisual consumer electronic products. Applied Ergonomics, 33(5), 419–431. Larson, R., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1983). The experience sampling method. New Directions for Methodology of Social and Behavioral Science, 15, 41–56. Law, E.L-C., Roto V., Hassenzahl, M., Vermeeren, A. P. O. S., & Kort J. (2009). Understanding, scoping and defining user experience: a survey approach. Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2009), Boston, MA 719–728. Law, E.L-C., Roto, V., Vermeeren, A. P. O. S., Kort, J., & Hassenzahl, M. (2008). Towards a shared definition of user experience. CHI ’08 extended abstracts on human factors in computing systems, 2395–2398, New York: ACM. Florence, Italy. Law, E.L-C., & Van Schaik, P. (2010). Modelling user experience: An agenda for research and practice. Interacting with Computers, 22(5), 313–322. Mäkelä, A., & Fulton Suri, J. (2001). Supporting users’ creativity: Design to induce pleasurable experiences. Proceedings of International Conference on Affective Human Factors Design, Singapore, 387–394. Marcus, A. (2006). Cross-cultural user-experience design. The International Symposium on Collaborative Technologies and Systems (CTS 2006), Las Vegas, NV. Marcus, A., Ashley, J., Knapheide, C., Lund, A., Rosenberg, D., & Vredenburg, K. (2009). A survey of userexperience development at enterprise software companies. Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Human Centered Design: Held as Part of HCI International 2009, San Diego, CA 601–610. McNamara, N., & Kirakowski, J. (2006). Functionality, usability, and user experience: Three areas of concern. Interactions, 13(6), 26–28. Nagamachi, M. (1995). Kansei engineering: A new ergonomic consumer-oriented technology for product development. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 15(1), 13–24. Nielsen Norman Group. 2010. User experience: Our definition. Retrieved March 23, 2010, from http://www.nngroup.com/about/userexperience.html


DOI: 10.1002/hfm



Picard, R. W. (1995). Affective computing. MIT Media Laboratory Technical Report No. 321 from http://affect.media.mit.edu/pdfs/95.picard.pdf Rokeach, M. (1973). The nature of human values. New York: Free Press. Roto, V. (2006). Web browsing on mobile phones: Characteristics of user experience. (Doctoral dissertation). Helsinki University of Technology, Finland. Russel, J. A. (2003). Core affect and the psychological construction of emotion. Psychological Review, 110(1), 145–172. Rust, R. T., Zeithaml, V. A., & Lemon, K. N. (2004). Customer-centered brand management. Harvard Business Review, 82(9), 110–118. ¨ (2004). A perspective on person-product relaSavas, O. tionship: Attachment and detachment. In D. McDonagh, P. Hekkert, J. Van Erp, & D. Gyi (Eds.), Design and emotion: The experience of everyday things. London: Taylor & Francis. Shackel, B. (1984). The concept of usability. In J. Bennet, D. Case, J. Sandelin, & M. Smith (Eds.), Visual display

terminals: Usability issues and health concerns. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Strawderman, L., & Koubek, R. (2008). Human factors and usability in service quality measurement. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing, 18(4), 454– 463. Swallow, D., Blythe, M., & Wright, P. (2005). Grounding experience: Relating theory and method to evaluate the user experience of smart phones, Proceedings of the 2005 Annual Conference on European Association of Cognitive Ergonomics (EACE 2005), Chania, Greece. Väa¨ nänen-Vainio-Mattila, K., Roto, V., & Hassenzahl, M. (2008). Towards practical user experience evaluation methods. Proceedings of the 5th COST294-MAUSE Open Workshop on Meaningful Measures: Valid Useful User Experience Measurement (VUUM 2008), Reykjavik, Iceland. Yoo, B., & Donthu, N. (2001). Developing and validating a multidimensional consumer-based brand equity scale. Journal of Business Research, 52(1), 1–14.


DOI: 10.1002/hfm

293