The purpose of this essay is to explore the importance of library design to students, whether the interior design of a library has any effect on their experience when using its services, and what the students themselves believe is most important for the library to do to stay afloat in a society that is constantly evolving and becoming more digital. The study will also bring up UX (User Experience) as a method for library design. The theories used in this study are the third place theory, as well as a comparison to the ideals of the Learning Commons model. In order to find out how the students view the library and the impact of its design, five interviews with five different students at Linneaus University in Växjö were conducted. The results show that the library generally inspires the students to feel motivated and at ease in a place that is comfortable and safe. It also shows that the design and the general atmosphere of the library does play a specific role in the students’ overall experience of the library as it impacts many of the choices they make while they’re there, such as where to sit or which places to avoid. The majority of the students are mostly happy with the library as it is except for minor inconveniences, and merely wishes for the library to continue in the same way in the future while adapting to any new changes that may come in its way.

I det här arbetet har det undersökts vilka faktorer som påverkar användares attityd till att använda nya IT-produkter. Vid användning utav en ny sorts IT-produkt påverkas användarens användning av IT-produkten beroende på ifall användaren har en positiv eller negativ attityd till det. För att titta på vilka faktorer som påverkar har det i detta arbete gjorts intervjuer och samlats in enkätsvar som sedan analyserades. De faktorer som togs fram för att titta på attityd var kunskap om systemet, bekvämlighet för användaren, effektivisering av uppgiften och omgivningen. Med hjälp av dessa faktorer kommer förhoppningsvis undersökningar av användarens attityder, innan IT-produkter har implementerats, underlättas.

Automatically recognizing gestures of the hand is a promising approach to communicating with computers, particularly when keyboard and mouse interactions are inconvenient, when only a brief interaction is necessary, or when a command involves a three-dimensional, spatial component. Which gestures are most convenient or preferred in various circumstances is unknown. This work explores the idea that perceived physical effort of a hand gesture influences users’ preference for using it when communicating with a computer. First, the hypothesis that people prefer gestures with less effort is tested by measuring the perceived effort and appeal of simple gestures. The results demonstrate that gestures perceived as less effortful are more likely to be accepted and preferred. The second experiment tests similar hypothesis with three-dimensional selection tasks. Participants used the tapping gesture to select among 16 targets in two environments that differ primarily in the physical distance required to finish the task. Participants, again, favor the less effortful environment over the other. Together the experiments suggest that effort is an important factor in user preference for gestures. The effort-to-reliability tradeoff existing in the majority of current gesture interfaces is then studied in experiment 3. Participants are presented 10 different levels of effort-to-reliability tradeoff and decide which tradeoff they prefer. Extreme conditions were intentionally avoided. On average they rate their preferred condition 4.23 in a 10-point scale in terms of perceived effort, and can achieve a success rate of approximately 70%. Finally, the question of whether pointing to objects enhances recall of their visuospatial position in a three-dimensional virtual environment is explored. The results show that pointing actually decreases memory relative to passively viewing. All in all, this work suggests that effort is an important factor, and there is an optimal balance for the effort-to-reliability tradeoff from a user’s perspective. The understanding and careful consideration of this point can help make future gesture interfaces more usable.

In the wake of digitalization and recent technological innovation, news consumers have increasingly moved to online spaces to access news. As changes in consumer behavior appear even within these new contexts, several legacy news publishers that are often linked with high journalistic quality and trust are struggling to monetize on their content. In such struggles, an increasingly common sight over the last couple of years is the implementation of paywalls; digital boundaries that require consumers to pay before accessing content. This work applies a design thinking approach, utilizing a mixed-method methodology by interviews, surveys, workshops, prototyping, and testing, to explore the users’ experiences of navigating this landscape, while at the same time taking the perspective of legacy news publishers into account. The first part of the report entails the identification of a set of design challenges in this regard. The second part focuses on one such challenge—the onboarding experience of paying readership online—and explores possible solutions where the experience of the users and the business of legacy news publishers can merge. It argues that, while still inducing some degree of irritation in the users, a registration-first model with multiple choices to pay is likely to create new opportunities for news publishers as they seek to charge for content online, while at the same time being appealing to a larger audience. However, the role of the relationship between the individual reader and the content itself was identified as absolutely central in increasing the value perception of news online.

<p>An increasing amount of technology in cars makes new ideas and solutions necessary. This study will explore the idea of a personalized driver environment and investigate possible benefits and drawbacks with such a feature. The study consists of three parts: a pre-study exploring personalization, a survey investigating the attitudes towards personal settings, and finally an interview testing a specific solution. The survey was distributed in USA and Sweden while the interviews were conducted with Swedish subjects.</p><p>Overall, the concept of a personalized car has been well received. This study has shown that the most requested settings are associated with the driver position, hi-fi system and climate. The study also suggests that feeling in control of the personalization is more important than the benefits associated with automation. The user prefers visible solutions, such as a personal button on the key before hidden (e.g. using a button sequence or a menu system). Such a button promotes the feature while allowing the user to interact with the car in a familiar way. However, since little real user experience exists with such solutions it is important to continue research when further developing personalization of a car.</p>

<p>Studiens syfte var att undersöka möjligheterna att använda intervjutekniken Repertory Grid Technique (RGT) som utvärderingsteknik för att utvärdera User Experience (UX) på distans. Detta gjordes genom att de föreställningar som en handledarstödd utvärdering resulterade i jämfördes med det resultat som uppnåddes genom en webbaserad variant av samma utvärdering. Studiens resultat visade på en svårighet för respondenterna i den webbaserade utvärderingen att formulera föreställningar som går att använda för analys av en produkts UX. Diskussionen pekar på en tänkbar lösning i form av förstudier som utförs med en mindre grupp av respondenter för att på detta sätt hjälpa utvärderarna att skapa sig en referensram att använda vid tolkningen av de föreställningar som sedan kan samlas in under en webbaserad utvärdering. Studien syftade även till att jämföra vilka aspekter kopplade till UX som utvärderingarna genererade, samtliga av dessa kopplades till subjektiva eller produktrelaterade aspekter.</p>

<p>This thesis investigates how to reach and recruit cutting-edge users to user experience studies. The recruitment of cutting-edge users is difficult since these users usually are not registered in recruitment databases. Cutting-edge users are advanced, early-adopters of technology and sometimes referred to as opinion leaders. Telecom research projects performed at Ericsson Research involve products and services 2-3 years ahead of the market; early-adopters and cutting edge users are therefore an important user group.</p><p> </p><p>To test recruitment methods a user experience study was performed of Ericsson Labs developer portal. Ericsson Labs offers Application Programming Interfaces for mobile and web applications development. Internet marketing theories were used to form a recruitment method. Respondents were recruited from the Ericsson Labs user database and they were contacted individually via email. The users were invited to share their thoughts and ideas about the portal to help improve and possibly influence the direction of the site.</p><p> </p><p>This thesis also assessed different online qualitative research methods applied for user experience research. Online focus groups such as bulletin boards were used to interact with users in addition to individual chat and voice interviews. Performing user experience research on the Internet is a cost-efficient way to interact with users in geographically dispersed areas.</p><p> </p><p>The findings from the study show that recruitment is hard; it is especially difficult to recruit active and conversational respondents from a user database. Providing incentives and using personal communication were shown to be successful strategies to convince users to participate in a study.</p>

Information Technology (IT) has been put forth as a reasonable way to sustain visitor interest and encourage visit repetition in museums. Therefore, IT is becoming more common in museum settings and professionals express their need for more information about how their visitors interact with these systems. This dissertation is an attempt to answer this call. We propose three essays that deal with different aspects of museums and IT from a user-centered perspective. The first essay is an attempt to determine with a free simulation experiment how IT and more particularly websites can arouse interest for museological content. The second essay relies on a field study to analyze the influence of IT on affective and cognitive reactions during a museum visit, namely perceived enjoyment, perceived authenticity and learning. In the third essay, we use focus groups and questionnaires to explore visitor expectations towards a phenomenological experience and the role played by IT in visitor experience of the past. This dissertation contributes to research by (1) advancing our knowledge of IT dedicated to the cultural heritage area, and (2) identifying and understanding visitor perceptions of hedonic systems. By proposing a set of key dimensions that could be used for IT evaluation in the cultural heritage, this dissertation also offers actionable advices to museum professionals.

This paper examines the potential benefits of using augmented reality as a tool for visualizing furniture in a buyer’s own environment before buying it. A simple prototype is developed and tested.  The steps for developing the prototype are described in great detail as well as the tools being used. The prototype is tested both on people working in the furniture business as well as people with experience in buying furniture online. In conclusion the results from the user tests are analyzed and the potential benefits are described. In addition to analyzing the potential benefits of the tool this paper also describes how this tool should be designed to best fit the needs of the would-be users.

This thesis investigates how to reach and recruit cutting-edge users to user experience studies. The recruitment of cutting-edge users is difficult since these users usually are not registered in recruitment databases. Cutting-edge users are advanced, early-adopters of technology and sometimes referred to as opinion leaders. Telecom research projects performed at Ericsson Research involve products and services 2-3 years ahead of the market; early-adopters and cutting edge users are therefore an important user group.   To test recruitment methods a user experience study was performed of Ericsson Labs developer portal. Ericsson Labs offers Application Programming Interfaces for mobile and web applications development. Internet marketing theories were used to form a recruitment method. Respondents were recruited from the Ericsson Labs user database and they were contacted individually via email. The users were invited to share their thoughts and ideas about the portal to help improve and possibly influence the direction of the site.   This thesis also assessed different online qualitative research methods applied for user experience research. Online focus groups such as bulletin boards were used to interact with users in addition to individual chat and voice interviews. Performing user experience research on the Internet is a cost-efficient way to interact with users in geographically dispersed areas.   The findings from the study show that recruitment is hard; it is especially difficult to recruit active and conversational respondents from a user database. Providing incentives and using personal communication were shown to be successful strategies to convince users to participate in a study.