Evaluation - Cognitive and Think Aloud AND conclusion

Evaluation

Cognitive evaluation

Four critical questions to ask for each action

·        Will the user try and achieve the right outcome?

·        Will users see the correct action they need to perform to produce the outcome? (visibility)

·        Will the user recognise that this is the action they need to take to achieve the correct outcome? (or will they select a different action instead?)

·        Will the user understand the feedback? If the correct action is performed; will the user see that progress is being made towards their intended outcome?

-        Series of steps to accomplish a task

1.      The user goes on to the homepage and check their daily caloric intake.

The user will see the correct action because the homepage is the first page they will see when they go on the app, and at the bottom of the page there is a navigation bar that shows multiple pages and which page the user is currently on.

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        Yes

2.      The user uses the app to track their meals for the day.

The user will automatically be directed to the homepage. The user will be able to see what action they need to take as the navigation bar is in a visible and consistent place and the user will click on the “Diary” page. The user will easily be able to log different meals of the day as the app has broken it into breakfast, lunch and dinner. When the user wants to log what food they had, they can search it on the search bar and recent food they have will also appear on the list to make it more efficient.

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        Yes (the user could go onto other pages as well before or after they track their meal)

-        Yes (if the user cannot understand they can just go back to the homepage)

3.      The user wants to track the calories burned by an exercise

The user will automatically be directed to the homepage when they go on the app. The user will go to the “Track Exercise” page by clicking it on the navigation bar. The user will then choose What exercise they want to track. Firstly, they will choose either cardio or resistance and then after that, the user will choose an exercise under that category. The user will be able to complete this task because there are visible cues such as navigation bar, titles on the page and a list showing exercises related to either cardio or resistance.

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        Yes

4.      The user wants to access the “Log” page

The user will be directed to the homepage when they go on the app. The user will clearly see the “log” because its located on the navigation bar. On the page, the user will clearly see their progress as it is translated onto a graph and the user will be able to log their weight every week or month.

-        Yes

-        Yes (It’s on the navigation bar)

-        Yes

-        Yes

5.      Options page

There is a button for Options page and it is located on every page, so the user can easily access it from which ever page they are on.

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        Yes

-        No(the user may not know what the button looks like)

Think Aloud Evaluation with users

In this evaluation the user will be asked to talk about:

·        What they are doing

·        What they believe the system is doing

·        Why they are taking a particular action

·        What they are trying to do

In this evaluation I will give the participants a brief description of what we are doing, and I will hand out a consent form to them, so they are aware their data may be used in our project. I will be asking the user to use our prototype made from Mockflow and the user will be asked to say their thoughts out loud and issues they may see when using the prototype. At the end of the evaluation, we will ask what they think of the app.

By doing Think-aloud evaluation will allow us to understand what parts of the app the user understands and does the app work in the way they expect. We have decided on this method because it is a simple technique to use and this method can be done on paper prototypes to the evaluation of fully functional systems. We understand there are some drawbacks to this method such as being observed can change what you do and, talking about what you’re doing can change what you do. However, we think the benefits of this method outweigh the disadvantages and we have decided to use it.

Participant 1

1.      “I’m on the homepage and I’m looking around the homepage to see where everything is, scrolling down to see what else is there on the homepage.”

2.      “Going to click on the navigation bar to go to another page and I’m going to check out the diary page and the page layout is okay, it’s nice I can just add food from recent list.”

3.      “I’m going to click on the “Track exercise” page and have a look at the list of exercises and how it works.”

“After using the app, I think it’s okay, everything that was essential was on the navigation bar and it was in a consistent place like the bottom of the screen, so my hand could easily reach it. The only thing I’m not so keen on is the homepage. Instead of blogs of what other users post, you could replace that with vital information of individual user.”

Participant 2

1.      “I’m looking at the homepage now, my eyes are checking where everything are, like the main info on the homepage.

2.      “I’m about to click on another page, looking at where the nav bar is and its at the bottom. I’m going on the “Diary” page and going to click on Breakfast, and it brings me to a new page to add the meals.

“The app isn’t bad, and it wasn’t hard to use. For the settings page, you could categorise the settings instead of one long list.”

Participant 3

1.      “My eyes are looking at the homepage now and just checking where everything are.”

2.      “Going to check out the other pages now, the menu isn’t too far from my hand and I can reach it quite easily.”

3.      “The layout of the “Track Exercise” page is easy to process and going back to other pages is okay.”

“I found the app was easy to use and the menu was at the bottom of the screen which means my hand could reach it and the menu was in a consistent position.”

Participants 4

1.      “I’m looking at the homepage now and just looking at where everything is located”

2.      “I’m looking around to find the menu bar, and going click on the different page”

“Overall, the app is okay to use, and it wasn’t hard to navigate my way on the app. I also like how I didn’t have to click a lot to get to a certain page or option that I want.”

Participant 5

1.      “Just looking around on the homepage and just looking at the main information that’s displayed.”

2.      “My eyes are locating where the menu bar is and I’m trying to go onto another page”

Conclusion

In conclusion, the user research went well without any problems because we have quickly identified who our target audience are which are students as we are based in university. Secondly, we have researched what is currently on the market and we have looked at the current apps such as MyfitnessPal to get ideas from it and using it as a guideline. From using existing apps as a guideline, we have made requirements of what our app should do, stated in the Plan for initial user research.

During the design stage, coming up and visualising the idea wasn’t too difficult as everyone on the team were on the same page. Our ideas were aligned with one another and all of us agreed on what the app should do. The process of making the paper prototype was very helpful to us when we were designing and refining the app, because we had users to test it out and the feedback they gave was co-operative during this stage of the project. After the paper prototype, we have produced our final and finished prototype made on Mockflow which shows all of the pages on the app and we have arrows showing if you click on this button, it will direct you to this page, and this shows all the possible paths.