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This field study examined how elderly and cognitively disabled people used and experienced a social companion robot. The following pages explores the questions: Which are the physical, social and affective qualities during the interaction? The aim was to through observations see how qualities of interaction could activate different forms of behavior. The results show that motion, sound and the eyes together created communicative and emotional changes for users who felt joy and were willing to share the activity with others. The robot stimulated to some extent users to create their own imaginative experiences but often failed to involve user or group for a long time and was also considered too large and heavy to handle. / Denna fältstudie undersökte hur äldre och kognitivt funktionsnedsatta personer använde och upplevde en social robot. Följande sidor utforskar frågorna: Vilka fysiska, sociala och affektiva kvaliteter finns i interaktionen? Målet var att genom observationer se hur kvaliteterna i interaktionen kunde aktivera olika typer av beteenden. Resultatet visar att rörelse, ljud och ögon tillsammans skapade kommunikativa och känslomässiga förändringar hos användarna som visade glädje och som gärna delade upplevelsen med andra. Roboten stimulerade till viss del användarna att skapa egna fantasifulla upplevelser men lyckades inte ofta involvera användare eller grupp under någon längre tid och ansågs även vara för stor och tung att hantera.

User experience (UX) is a multi-dimensional user-product interaction involving positive and emotional usage. Fun experience is a component of UX which maintains distinctive dimensions. In this study these dimensions of the fun concept, namely the nature of the experience, the qualities of products that take place in the experience, and the emotional content of the fun experiences are investigated. The thesis is supported by arguments collected from the literature and the data from two empirical studies.

<p>Many interactive products and services have made the move from stationary or desktop applications to dedicated mobile devices. Sonys Playstation has evolved into the PSP (playstation portable), Apples iPod is fully integrated with iTunes, Microsoft’s new media player is rumored to carry the Xbox brand and browsers like Internet Explorer and Opera can be used on pocket PCs, cell phones and Smart Phones. A very interesting example of this development is the global telephony company Skype that offers free calls over the Internet as well as instant messaging, video conferencing among many other things. Skype is making its way from the desktop to a wide array of devices, stressing the need for a unified brand experience. This thesis seeks to explore the different interactive aspects that constitute the user experience of a specific brand. Through listing the use qualities fulfilled by the services in the primary product and examining their requirements and dependencies in the user interface, this thesis proposes a method to foresee potential confinements in the brand experience when distributing an interactive product or service to a new platform. The thesis also aims at examining how the method can be used in the design process.</p>

<p>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.</p>

The field of interaction design is constantly shifting with the introduction of new technologies that allow individuals the ability to interact with or act upon an environment, such as installations that use motion tracking as an input device, or allowing users to interact with an environment with their mobile device. This shift from the interaction with traditional computers (static machines) to machines that react to people and environments, requires designers to reevaluate how these new platforms can be effectively used to communicate information and have a lasting affect on participants. There is a great challenge in the articulation of new interaction models. Many people tend to hold on to more traditional or familiar methods of interacting with their devices, as these new methods of engagement require the learning of new metaphors for interaction. How do we construct systems that engage and motivate people to use unfamiliar systems? The work presented in this report is my attempt to answer this question by exploring emerging spatial interface technologies. / text

In this study, we focus primarily on the importance of organisation and UX-maturity for applying user experience (UX). What does this mean for designers when maturity is low or high? The study shows that the user is an expert based on his/her personal experience of a product, allowing the user to select and influence solutions that best meet his/her needs. UX maturity is a highlighted concept in this UX study. If UX maturity of an organisation is low then UX is likely only applied by few or no one within the design team. If the maturity on the other hand is high, the organisation and its design team work with an UX-approach. The approach therefore becomes a part of the organisational culture and through this shows how the business benefits of UX. This then creates a win-win situation for the user, designer and organisation. If however everybody practices UX, what will then happen to the UX-role? Is it however reasonable that only one person should be responsible for UX? We gathered 12 experts from companies in Gothenburg and talked about how it has been, present challenges and together we speculated about the future UX role. We also discussed the significance organisations maturity has for those who work with UX. The results show that knowledge of UX should be disseminated at all levels and that at a high maturity UX strategy becomes part of the overall plan. When the maturity is high practitioners of UX get the opportunity to narrow and broaden their skills. Is maturation however low more responsibility may be placed upon the individual designer. The designer may not have the same opportunity to become an expert in their field and are instead forced to have a wider and not as deep expertise. / Detta arbete fokuserar främst på organisationens och den upplevda UX-mognadens betydelse för den som tillämpar user experience (UX). Vad innebär det för designers när mognaden är låg respektive hög? Man menar att användaren är expert, detta baserat på sin upplevelse av produkten. Idag kan användare själv välja vilka lösningar som bäst motsvarar önskade behov. I denna studie om UX lyfts begreppet UX-mognad. Om UX-mognaden i en organisation är låg betyder det att eventuellt ingen eller få i designteamet tänker användarcentrerad design. Är mognaden däremot hög innebär det att organisation och designteam gemensamt jobbar med UX som förhållningssätt. Det skapar en win-win-situation för både användare, designer och organisation. Men om alla nu å andra sidan använder termen och jobbar UX, vad kommer då att hända med rollen UX? Är det rimligt att enbart en person skall ansvara för UX? Vi samlade 12 experter från företag i Göteborg och samtalade om vilka utmaningar som funnits, vilka som finns idag och tillsammans talade vi om UX-rollen. Vi diskuterade även om den betydelse som en organisations mognad har för de som arbetar med UX. Resultatet visar att kunskap om UX bör spridas i alla led och att med hög mognad blir UX-strategi en del av den övergripande planen. Utövare av UX får här tillfälle att ge sin kompetens en spets och ett djup. Är mognaden däremot låg kan det ligga mer ansvar på den enskilde designern, designern får heller inte samma möjlighet att bli expert på sitt område, utan tvingas ha en bredare och inte lika djup kompetens.

The development of movement based technology is changing the way we interact with our computer systems. This study aims to answer questions about how this change is occurring and aspects following it. A number of different data collection methods are put to use as twenty informants takes part in a series of experiments regarding different application areas. The movement based technologies utilized by the informants are Leap Motion and Myo. Through the use of user experience and usability the study shows that movement based technology performs worse than the mouse in all tested application areas. On the other hand we found that the user experience is enhanced with the use of movement based technology in all but one of the tested application areas.

This study examines how Design principles affect the view of Usability in Agile development. This case study has been conducted together with Uppsala Municipality’s Development department. The Design principles from Användningsforum and Government Digital Service are studied together with Agile development strategy to determine the influence on Usability. This is an empirical inductive study where data is collected and analyzed so that a theory may be presented. The thesis is based on qualitative data gathered from Uppsala Municipality’s development project and focus on the experience and attitude of the developers in the department. Data is collected through interviews and observations of the team members. Data is analyzed with Grounded theory approach. From the results it is concluded that the Design principles influence members of the department's awareness and focus on Usability when work with Agile development project.

The research community around gesture-based interaction has so far not paid attention to the possibility of replacing the keyboard with natural gestures for writing purposes. Additionally, insight into the actual user experience of such an interaction style is only insufficiently provided. This work presents a novel approach for text input that is based on a manual alphabet, MATImyo. The hand alphabet was developed in a user-centered design process involving potential users in pre-studies, design process and evaluation procedure. In a Wizard-of-Oz style experiment with accompanying interviews, the alphabet’s quality as input language for composing electronic texts was evaluated and the user experience of such an interaction style assessed. MATImyo was found to be very suitable as gestural input language with a positive user experience. The whole process of designing MATImyo and evaluating its suitability and user experience was based on the principles of Embodied Interaction, which was chosen as theoretical framework. This work contributes to understanding the bigger picture of the user experience of gesture-based interaction and presents a novel, more natural text input method.