Resources
- Greenberg, S. and Buxton. Usability Evaluation Considered Harmful (Some of the Time), CHI 2008, p 111 – 120. ACM Press, NY, NY, USA.
- Marking Guide
Overview
You and a partner are going to critically respond to two questions related to Greenberg and Buxton’s CHI 2008 paper: Usability Evaluation Considered Harmful (Some of the Time). Your responses need to showcase your comprehension of the issues raised by Greenberg and Buxton and your reflection on how this information influences your future goals as designers. The questions you and your partner need to respond to are included at the end of this outline. Pick one from each category (Comprehension and Reflection) that you and your partner feel you can respond to with maximum clarity and confidence.
Evaluation Criteria
Your responses should convince your readers that you have good comprehension of the content of Greenberg and Buxton’s paper. You should also convince your readers that you can critically reflect on points raised by the paper in terms of your practice as designers. Your responses will not only be evaluated for grammatical and formal correctness, but also for clear writing style and persuasive power.
You should take one page (single spaced, regular-sized font, at least 80% of the page and no more than one page). Try to be as direct and concise as possible. Those marking your responses should be able to easily tell that you have understood the paper and the assignment, and that you have thought carefully about how the points raised in the paper may affect you. You can use figures, diagrams, and pictures to strengthen your responses where appropriate but this is not included in your one page limit.
Respond to each question as a pair – do not have one partner answer question one, and the other answer question two. This strategy will most likely result in a poor grade. Discuss your thoughts on the questions with each other and respond based on your conclusions from those discussions.
A good way to add persuasive power to your responses is to cite and quote specific parts of Greenberg and Buxton’s paper, as well as other design-related writing you are familiar with. Feel free to use examples from your work in other courses or from experiences you have had outside of school to support your responses. Few references or references that don’t relate to your responses will most likely result in a poor grade.
Comprehension Questions
Choose one of the following questions to respond to:
- How do we recognize situations where usability is inappropriate? What are alternate evaluation methods (besides usability) in these situations?
- Why is a methodological bias toward quantitative usability evaluations problematic?
- What is the difference between sketching and prototyping (as defined by Greenberg and Buxton)? What are examples of sketching and prototyping from your own design work?
Reflection Questions
Choose one of the following questions to respond to:
- Are quantitative usability evaluation methods easier to teach (or learn) than “design, field studies, etc.”? Why would Greenberg and Buxton believe this?
- Are any of the usability methods covered in IAT 432 suitable for evaluating a design’s usefulness in a cultural context? If so, which ones? If not, suggest other methods you have learned at SIAT or outside of school that help determine a design’s usefulness. (Hint: you should start with a clear definition of “useful”.)