Internet är för många en självklarhet för att kunna dela och ta del av information. För andra kan användandet av internet vara frustrerande och exkluderande. En sådan grupp är personer med olika former av synnedsättningar. För dessa personer finns vissa verktyg tillgängliga så som screen readers. Dessa underlättar för personer som är helt eller delvis blinda men kan upplevas som långsamma att använda för personer som till viss del klarar av att utan stöd av en screen reader. För att underlätta för dessa personer kan ljud användas i olika delar av användargränssnittet. En studie genomfördes för att undersöka hur en modifierad navigeringsmeny med ljud påverkar tiden det tar för användare att lösa navigeringsrelaterade uppgifter i en webbapplikation. Webbapplikationen använde sig av en simulering av synnedsättningen glaukom (grön starr). Resultaten visade inte på några statistiskt signifikanta skillnader varken gällande tiden det tog att lösa uppgifterna eller hur svår navigeringsmenyn upplevdes att använda. Utifrån detta dras slutsatsen att ljud inte påverkar hur lätt eller svårt det är för användare att lösa navigeringsrelaterade uppgifter.

no / The results from previous experiments using structured musical stimuli to communicate coordinate locations within a graphical grid, navigation of an auditory cursor and simple shapes are used as a basis for further exploratory research to communicate diagrams. An experimental framework program (called AudioGraph) provided a platform for investigating musical information processing for blind users. Under this platform, simple arrangements of shapes (forming diagrams) were communicated to users using structured musical stimuli. Meaningfully arranged graphical shapes (at least for the visual sense) were communicated in the absence, and in the presence of a particular perceptual context or different perceptual contexts. The results indicated that perceptual context played an important role in the interpretation of the structured musical stimuli that communicated simple diagrams. The paper concludes with a discussion on the implications of the results, the role of context and the use of structured musical stimuli to communicate graphical information to visually impaired users.

There has been an increasing demand for commercial organisations to foster real-time interaction with customers, because harnessing customer competencies has been shown to be a major contributor towards various benefits, such as growth, innovation and competition. This may drive organisations to embrace the development of multimodal interaction and complement Electronic Customer Knowledge Management Systems (E-CKMS) with metaphors of audio-visual nature. Although the implementation of E-CKMS encounters several challenges, such as lack of trust and information overload, few empirical studies were devoted to assess the role of audio-visual metaphors, and investigate whether these technologies can be put into practice. Therefore, this thesis describes a comparative evaluation study carried out to examine the implication of incorporating multimodal metaphors into E-CKMS interfaces on not only usability of E-CKMS, but also the user's trust, knowledge and acceptance. An experimental E-CKMS platform was implemented with three different modes of interaction: Visual-only E-CKMS (VCKMS) with text and graphics, Multimodal E-CKMS (MCKMS) with speech, earcons and auditory icons and Avatar-enhanced multimodal E-CKMS (ACKMS). The three platforms were evaluated by three independent groups of twenty participants each (total=60) who carried out eight common tasks of increasing complexity and design based on three different styles. Another dependent group of forty-eight participants (n=48) was instructed to interact with the systems under similar usability conditions by performing six common tasks of two styles, and fill a questionnaire devised to measure the aspects of user acceptance. The results therein revealed that ACKMS was more usable and acceptable than both MCKMS and VCKMS, whereas MCKMS was more usable than VCKMS, but less acceptable. Inferential Statistics indicated that these results were statistically significant.

No / This paper introduces a comparative multi-group study carried out to investigate the use of multimodal interaction metaphors (visual, oral, and aural) for improving learnability (or usability from first time use) of interface-design environments. An initial survey was used for taking views about the effectiveness and satisfaction of employing speech and speech-recognition for solving some of the common usability problems. Then, the investigation was done empirically by testing the usability parameters: efficiency, effectiveness, and satisfaction of three design-toolkits (TVOID, OFVOID, and MMID) built especially for the study. TVOID and OFVOID interacted with the user visually only using typical and time-saving interaction metaphors. The third environment MMID added another modality through vocal and aural interaction. The results showed that the use of vocal commands and the mouse concurrently for completing tasks from first time use was more efficient and more effective than the use of visual-only interaction metaphors.

There has been an increasing demand for commercial organisations to foster real-time interaction with customers, because harnessing customer competencies has been shown to be a major contributor towards various benefits, such as growth, innovation and competition. This may drive organisations to embrace the development of multimodal interaction and complement Electronic Customer Knowledge Management Systems (E-CKMS) with metaphors of audio-visual nature. Although the implementation of E-CKMS encounters several challenges, such as lack of trust and information overload, few empirical studies were devoted to assess the role of audio-visual metaphors, and investigate whether these technologies can be put into practice. Therefore, this thesis describes a comparative evaluation study carried out to examine the implication of incorporating multimodal metaphors into E-CKMS interfaces on not only usability of E-CKMS, but also the user¿s trust, knowledge and acceptance. An experimental E-CKMS platform was implemented with three different modes of interaction: Visual-only E-CKMS (VCKMS) with text and graphics, Multimodal E-CKMS (MCKMS) with speech, earcons and auditory icons and Avatar-enhanced multimodal E-CKMS (ACKMS). The three platforms were evaluated by three independent groups of twenty participants each (total=60) who carried out eight common tasks of increasing complexity and design based on three different styles. Another dependent group of forty-eight participants (n=48) was instructed to interact with the systems under similar usability conditions by performing six common tasks of two styles, and fill a questionnaire devised to measure the aspects of user acceptance. The results therein revealed that ACKMS was more usable and acceptable than both MCKMS and VCKMS, whereas MCKMS was more usable than VCKMS, but less acceptable. Inferential Statistics indicated that these results were statistically significant.

Impersonal, non-face-to-face contact and text-based interfaces, in the e-Learning segment, present major problems that are encountered by learners, since they are out on vital personal interactions and useful feedback messages, as well as on real-time information about their learning performance. This research programme suggests a multimodal, combined with an edutainment approach, which is expected to improve the communications between users and e-Learning systems. This thesis empirically investigates users’ effectiveness; efficiency and satisfaction, in order to determine the influence of edutainment, (e.g. amusing speech and facial expressions), combined with multimodal metaphors, (e.g. speech, earcon, avatar, etc.), within e-Learning environments. Besides text, speech, visual, and earcon modalities, avatars are incorporated to offer a visual and listening realm, in online learning. The methodology used for this research project comprises a literature review, as well as three experimental platforms. The initial experiment serves as a first step towards investigating the feasibility of completing all the tasks and objectives in the research project, outlined above. The remaining two experiments explore, further, the role of edutainment in enhancing e-Learning user interfaces. The overall challenge is to enhance user-interface usability; to improve the presentation of learning, in e-Learning systems; to improve user enjoyment; to enhance interactivity and learning performance; and, also, to contribute in developing guidelines for multimodal involvement, in the context of edutainment. The results of the experiments presented in this thesis show an improvement in user enjoyment, through satisfaction measurements. In the first experiment, the enjoyment level increased by 11%, in the Edutainment (E) platform, compared to the Non-edutainment (NE) interface. In the second experiment, the Game-Based Learning (GBL) interface obtained 14% greater enhancement than the Virtual Class (VC) interface and 20.85% more than the Storytelling interface; whereas, the percentage obtained by the game incorporated with avatars increased by an extra 3%, compared with the other platforms, in the third experiment. In addition, improvement in both user performance and learning retention were detected through effective and efficiency measurements. In the first experiment, there was no significant difference between mean values of time, for both conditions (E) & (NE) which were not found to be significant, when tested using T-test. In the second experiment, the time spent in condition (GBL) was higher by 7-10 seconds, than in the other conditions. In the third experiment, the mean values of the time taken by the users, in all conditions, were comparable, with an average of 22.8%. With regards to effectiveness, the findings of the first experiment showed, generally, that the mean correct answer for condition (E) was higher by 20%, than the mean for condition (NE). Users in condition (GBL) performed better than the users in the other conditions, in the second experiment. The percentage of correct answers, in the second experiment, was higher by 20% and by 34.7%, in condition (GBL), than in the (VC) and (ST), respectively. Finally, a set of empirically derived guidelines was produced for the design of usable multimodal e-Learning and edutainment interfaces.

Det här arbetet syftar till att genom design av en telefonapplikation undersöka hur ljud kan förstärkas av den omgivande miljön. Arbetet visar på hur miljöförstärkt ljud skiljer sig från ljudförstärkt miljö samt vilka begränsningar det innebär att använda en vanlig smartphone som plattform.  Ett långsiktigt mål är att genom en produkt som låter oetablerade ljudproducenter distribuera sina alster i den offentliga miljön främja fri kultur och kreativitet. Arbetet har följt principen för RtD (research through design), där designprocessen utgör det fall som studeras och dokumentationen av den utgör den bas av data som analyseras och leder till slutsatser kring ämnet. Designprocessen i detta arbete innebär en mindre omfattande användarstudie i enkätform för att identifiera målgrupp, krav och mål. Följd av en andra studie där en prototyp framtagen med grund i resultaten från användarstudien utvärderas av deltagare genom observation, intervju och reaktionskort.  De största utmaningarna för designen grundar sig i att ta fram en applikation som inte stör upplevelsen, men samtidigt kan instruera användaren i hur man använder applikationen. Utifrån arbetet dras slutsatsen att användarinstruktioner, såväl visuella som auditiva, löper större risk att störa upplevelsen i miljöförstärkt ljud än i ljudförstärkt miljö. Vidare konstateras att den största bristen i en lösning som bygger på standardutrustning i jämförelse med en lösning som nyttjar dedikerad utrustning utgörs av begränsningar när det kommer till att ange riktning med hjälp av ljudets rumslighet.