Tom Noonan of Elsevier’s User Centered Design Group Answers Your Usability Questions
Tom Noonan earned his BA in psychology and an MA and PhD in experimental psychology, all from the University of Louisville. He began his career with IBM and has also worked with a start-up venture and with Circuit City, Inc. Holding the position of senior human factors engineer, Tom has since 2001 worked for Elsevier and led the ScienceDirect User Centered Design team.
A: Identifying users to participate in usability testing involves a straightforward process. First you must identify your types of users. Almost every website has multiple audiences who want to use the site in different ways. Different users have different needs and expectations. Concentrate on the tasks that you have designed your site to enable. What types of users most need to accomplish the tasks? For example, are these tasks that library staff, undergraduates or experienced researchers perform?
Tom Noonan
Once you have identified types of users, select a variety of users from the primary user groups. Try to sample a reasonable cross section of the user groups. Don’t limit your test to co-workers or those anxious to be test participants.
Now that you have your users lined up, keep the following in mind:
- Keep the test short. People are more willing to volunteer if the time required is short. If it isn’t necessary that each person attempt each task, it’s okay to have different users attempt subsets of the tasks.
- If feasible, test the site at a workstation near the users or in their offices. If you can test the site when and where it is convenient to them, you are more likely to get volunteers.
- When testing, don’t be judgmental and have patience. Some people get nervous in such a situation and take some time to become comfortable. Be considerate. Remind them that you are testing the product, not them!
- If the test requires that you interact with or interview the user, try to have someone else take test notes. It’s difficult to interact gracefully with a user and, at the same time, record your observations.
- Finally be polite and maybe they’ll volunteer again. Remember they are helping you.
- Kaufman, J. (2006). Practical usability testing. Digital Web Magazine. www.digital-web.com
- Rubin, J. (1994). Handbook of usability testing: How to plan, design, and conduct effective tests. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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