Research for Usage Oriented Design: Quantitative? Qualitative?

Abstract

Theory of user-product interaction is summarised and implemented in a graphical representation. This graphical representation stresses the central role of user activities (perception, cognition/experience and use actions including any effort) in dealing with featural and functional product characteristics. The interaction is primarily seen as situated, and constrained by, rather than being predictable from, human characteristics and capacities; no role is given in the graphical representation to mental representations. For observational research to be supportive of usage oriented design, there are two requirements: a focus on user activities, and a direct link from these activities to featural and functional product characteristics. It is argued that qualitative studies constitute the obvious type of research to meet these criteria. Quantitative research may also be possible as is illustrated with an empirical example. It is experimentation, in the sense of hypothesis testing, involving control and standardisation in order to establish some causality, which tends to fall short in linking natural user activities to product characteristics.