Workplaces way of communicating and sharing information has changed trough out the years, and digitalization has given new opportunities to how workplaces can communicate using technology. A popular tool used for presenting information is large digital screens. A company that uses a screen like this to present information to their employees is Xlent in Umeå. This thesis is about investigating how this screen can come to better use at the workplace, by creating a new system that combines office information, currently presented on the screen, with employees’ schedules that previously have been managed on a whiteboard. The new solution was implemented as a web application, allowing a user to access the application on any preferred platform. An administrator can therefore, during a meeting, directly change the content presented on the TV-screen from a cellphone or laptop. Due to the current global pandemic, Covid-19, could the new system not be tested within the workplace, instead, it was tested from an administrative point of view. Usability testing for the sought usage within the workplace is left as future work.

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This licentiate thesis aims to establish the basis for scientifically understanding and supporting the cognitive processes involved in the conceptual design of resource- efficient and effective product-service systems (PSSs). The research carried out is transdisciplinary in nature and includes both prescriptive and descriptive studies. First, the cognitive nature of conceptual PSS designing is investigated. Multiple pre-experimental protocol studies in a laboratory setting are carried out to do so. The cohort of these explorative studies includes experienced industrial practitioners conceptually designing a resource-efficient PSS. These descriptive studies provide quantitative insights into the cognitive effort expended by designers on various design issues and processes during conceptual PSS designing and its potential differences to conceptual product designing. These insights form the basis for future research that can eventually shine light on this complex process with statistically significant empirical results. Second, the essence of extant prescriptive PSS design principles, methods and tools is distilled through a literature analysis and synthesis of the state of the art. Subsequently, important aspects that need to be considered during conceptual PSS designing are consolidated in the form of a PSS design schema. Third, a design navigator named lifecycle-oriented function deployment (LFD) is developed. LFD is essentially a contextual decision-making support tool, developed to guide the conceptual designing of environmentally benign PSSs. This tool informs the designers regarding the potential environmental impacts of specific design parameters of an existing offering. It subsequently guides the designers in the redesign of this existing offering into a PSS with relatively benign environmental impacts. Fourth, the effects of the two proposed prescriptions are tested empirically. True experimental protocol studies are carried out in a laboratory setting to test the effects of the prescriptive PSS design schema on the cognition of PSS designers. LFD is applied in an industrial case study using the action design research method, to support the conceptual redesign of an existing product-centric offering into an environmentally benign PSS. Environmental impacts of the PSS concepts generated using LFD are then evaluated in comparison to that of the existing offering, using simulated lifecycle assessment. A semi-structured interview is carried out to evaluate the utility and usability of LFD, with the company personnel involved in the conceptual redesign process. This licentiate thesis is an effort to effectively design the future research work of the author. This future work will aim to support and establish generalizable scientific knowledge regarding the conceptual designing of resource-efficient and effective PSSs. / <p>Forskningsfinansiär: Mistra REES (Resource Efficient and EffectiveSolutions) program funded by Mistra (The Swedish Foundation for StrategicEnvironmental Research) (grant number DIA 2014/16).</p>

Mobile gaming was in 2019 the biggest revenue-creating area of gaming, beating all other forms of gaming combined. Despite this, mobile manager games are still a fairly unexplored genre. The thesis explores the area of social features in these kinds of games. Studies around the success of social networks, engaging features in mobile apps and good UX practices in mobile games were made. These findings together with a questionnaire with 87 participants created a framework of how a social feature should look like when implementing into a manager game. The feature, Social League, was designed and implemented in the game World Football Manager created by Gold Town Games. The feature is available from Friday’s through Sunday’s. Data was collected from World Football Manager prior to the implementation of Social League to get measurable data. The most central data was average game time of the players. Six weeks after Social League got implemented, the thesis studied the app and the updated data. The result showed a moderate increase of player session during the whole week, 7.3%. While looking exclusively on weekends, the average session increased by 15%, a major increase. This suggests that an introduced social aspect should increase the engagement of users in a mobile manager game.

The modern design of web-based tools derives from well-established patterns and design principles that lead to the desired UX in form of comprehension and intuition. The intuitive impression is usually obtained from previous experience, however, from the use of other similar web-based tools. This thesis is conducted in collaboration with iMatrics AB. One of iMatrics ambitions is to build a long-term sustainable demo tool which is to be integrated into their web portal where their products and services are accessible from. To achieve a satisfying user experience, a large focus on the design and the needs is required to keep and increase the number of users. First impressions, intuition, usability, and overall satisfaction in terms of usability are all important factors of an interface. This paper aims at studying is the perception of these factors in a user-centered scope from both technical and non-technical users’ perspectives where remote contextual inquiry with applied design thinking will be conducted. Interviews, use case studies and surveys will be part of the data gathering process. Initially, the current autotagging demo will be studied and a new demo will be developed, evaluated and compared to the current demo. This study involves a total of 8 participants with a customer or employee relationship with iMatrics. Eventually, this study will point out the overall improvements in the new demo compared to the current demo and also suggest UX features benefiting for both technical and non-technical users.

In order to be competitive in the marketplace, all company’s need to have a well-established and thought-out brand. It is difficult to create a brand that conveys the right feeling and establishes a connection with its target group. The process consists of many steps and subjective opinions are difficult to measure. This study aims to determine how a branding process can be conceptualized and performed, in order to ensure a connection with its target audience, as well as how the results objectively can be measured. In this context, a branding process is defined as the proceedings of a series of well-defined activities used to develop a value system, and communication framework for a business. To investigate how a brand can be created, and measure its impact on the target audience, a literature review and semi-structured interviews were held with experts within the field. Based on these findings, a brand identity and strategy was developed through a number of workshop exercises, held with the founders of a start-up company named Kurr. A brand identity was established, and a new design of the company website was created. An online survey containing a desirability test was sent out to people within and outside the company’s target audience to measure the response of the website and brand. During the desirability test, the respondents got to view a prototype of the company website and then select 3 - 5 words from a list of 20 that best described their initial emotions of the brand. The results showed that the top five words chosen by the target audience matched with the five intended emotions picked for the brand. These findings reinforce previous research that highlights the importance of a well-thought- out brand strategy and identity. The results suggests that brand archetypes can be effective to use when developing a new brand. Further, the research shows that Microsoft desirability test can be used to provide data on how a brand is perceived by its audience.

Interactions with others can influence our decision-making, often without us being aware of it. There is a link between influence and decision-making, while, the extent to which other people's decisions influence our own is a multi-faceted and complex question considering our unique personalities and ways of thinking in different areas. This thesis focuses on designing a game in the form of a quiz primarily for In-flight entertainment (IFE) systems, where the game is supposed to provide a multiplayer experience where the contestants can compete against each other in different categories. In addition to the research, this thesis also bridges the gap between game influences and the psychology behind them and links the areas of game design, games, psychology and decision-making. The work was divided into five different phases according to the "Design Thinking" method. The first phase, empathise, was about gaining a deeper understanding of the interaction between games, influence, psychology and decision-making. The second phase, define, focused on defining problems that could be converted into ideas and solutions in the third phase, ideate. The fourth phase, prototype, was about developing prototypes in the form of Lo-Fi, Mid-Fi and Hi-Fi which were later tested in the last and fifth phases, test. Participants got to test the game with and without data visualisation that was present in some questions in the form of bar charts. The result showed that the majority of the participants, corresponding to 66.7%, felt influenced by that graph. However, 7 out of 15 participants, corresponding to 46.7%, felt an increased sense of confidence in their answers when their answers matched the majority on the graph. While 8 out of 15 people, corresponding to 53.3%, did not experience an increase in confidence from the graph's presence. However, this does not negate the graph's potential influence on participants' decision-making process and decision-making. There are other factors that may have influenced this such as the participants' existing knowledge and their conscious decision to refrain from relying on the graph. Data visualisation has some impact on decision-making especially when it comes to areas of reduced knowledge certainty, and the degree to which individuals yield to external influences is dependent on their existing knowledge. / Interaktioner med andra kan påverka vårt beslutsfattande, ofta utan att vi är medvetna om det. Det finns en koppling mellan inflytande och beslutsfattande, dock i vilken utsträckning andra människors beslut påverkar våra egna är ett mångfacetterat och komplex fråga, tanken på våra unika personligheter och tankesätt i olika områden. Denna avhandling fokuserade på att designa ett spel i form av ett frågesport främst för In-flight entertainment (IFE) system, där spelet ska ge en multiplayer-upplevelse där de tävlande kan tävla mot varandra i olika kategorier. Förutom undersökningen överbryggar även avhandlingen klyftan mellan spels inflytande och psykologi bakom dem samt länkar ihop områdena speldesign, spel, psykologi, inflytande och beslutsfattande. Arbetet delades in i fem olika faser enligt metoden “Design Thinking”. Första fasen, empathise , handlade om att få en djupare förståelse av samspelet mellan spel, inflytande, psykologi och beslutsfattande. Andra fasen, define, fokuserade på att definiera problemet som kunde omvandlas till idéer och lösningar i tredje fasen, ideate. Fjärde fasen, prototypen, handlade om att utveckla prototyper i form av Lo-Fi, Mid-Fi och Hi-Fi som senare testades i sista och femte fasen, test. Deltagarna fick testa spelet med och utan datavisualisering som var närvarande i vissa frågor i form av stapeldiagram. Resultatet visade att majoriteten av deltagarna, motsvarande 66.7%, kände sig påverkade av grafen. Dock kände 7 av 15 deltagare, motsvarande 46.7%, en ökad känsla av förtroende för sina svar när deras svar överensstämde med majoriteten på grafen. Medan 8 av 15 personer, motsvarande 53.3%, upplevde inte en ökning av förtroende av grafens närvaro. Detta förnekar dock inte grafens potentiella inflytande på deltagarnas beslutsprocess och beslutsfattande. Det finns andra faktorer som kan har påverkat beslutsfattandet såsom deltagarnas befintliga kunskap och deras medvetna beslut att avstå från att förlita sig på grafen. Datavisualisering har till en viss del en inverkan på beslutsfattandet, särskilt när det kommer till områden med kunskapsosäkerhet, och i vilken grad individer ger efter för yttre påverkan är beroende av deras befintliga kunskap.

As Mixed Reality (MR) games are becoming more and more integrated into healthcare, the need to create engaging and motivating games for rehabilitation purposes is of the utmost importance. To investigate what factors in MR games make users intrinsically motivated and engaged, 13 participants played five games of different types and rewards. After each game, a questionnaire measuring four subcategories for intrinsic motivation was performed. After playing all games, interviews were conducted to voice the participants' opinions. The results showed that there were multiple factors in an MR game contributing to the engagement and motivation of the users. The questionnaire results also revealed a significant difference between the subcategory interest/enjoyment and perceived competence. The themes identified from the interviews were the need for the game to be sufficiently challenging, interaction with MR, curiosity, as well as emotional design. These conclusions suggest a start for future research with larger samples but are argued to be transferable to different sets of target groups.

Gait analysis can be described as a study of human walking patterns. This is very useful in health care, since gait analysis can reveal important information about a patient, and be an aid in diagnosis and rehabilitation. Today gait analysis is done either by qualitative visual observation of the patient, or in resource demanding and advanced laboratory settings. Many studies have been done in the search for new technical solutions that enables quantitative gait analysis outside of the laboratory. The goal of this thesis was to evaluate the usability of a new gait analysis system and to find out how the user interface could be better adapted to the end user’s needs and goals. This was done by defining and using suitable methods for learning about the users, evaluating the system and by defining usability in a clinical setting. A redesigned prototype was then developed and tested. It was found that the original user interface had many usability issues and was in need of better adaption to the intended user group. Through user research personas and key user needs could be determined that became the basis for the design work, along with guidelines from previous studies within the field. The redesigned prototype was tested on potential end users. It was in this study determined that semi-structured interviews are suitable for learning about the users. Usability evaluation should preferably be done using a combination of evaluation that involves real end users and evaluation by usability experts. Guidelines for usability in clinical systems could also be defined. Considering the redesigned prototype, the users saw a great potential, and could see themselves using it in the future. The testing determined that the redesigned prototype managed to solve many of the usability issues found in the original design.

Användare vill idag snabbt och enkelt kunna hitta den information de behöver på sina mobiltelefoner. Enheten erbjuder lättillgänglighet och möjlighet till interaktion när de vill, var de vill. Denna studie har undersökt hur ett gränssnitt för smartphones kan utformas som presenterar en större mängd information till användaren i form av teknisk dokumentation, exempelvis manualer. Studien är framtagen i uppdrag från Combitech som upplever ett problem i att presentera större mängd data på mindre enheter. Fokus i denna studie har legat i att implementera och utvärdera olika designriktlinjer för mobiltelefoner. En prototyp utvecklades i två iterationer där respektive prototypiteration testades på användare genom uppdrag, bedömningsskala och intervju. Studien indikerar på ett resultat där ett antal riktlinjer gynnar användarupplevelsen när det gäller ett mobilt gränssnitt för att söka information. Detta innefattar bland annat att förenkla och prioritera uppgifterna för användaren så gott det går för att minska dess kognitiva belastning. Det presenteras även mer konkreta riktlinjer beträffande klickytor, lokalisering, horisontell scrollning, samt funktionalitet för ändring av textstorlek. / Users today want to be able to find the information they need quickly and easily on their mobile phones. These devices offers easy-access and enables interaction whenever they want, wherever they want. This study examines how a smartphone interface for presenting larger quantities of information from technical documentation, such as manuals, should be designed.This study was commissioned by Combitech, who have experienced issues when presenting a larger amount of data on smaller devices. The focus of this study was to implement and evaluate various design guidelines for mobile phones. A prototype was developed in two iterations, where each iteration was evaluated through tasks, rating scales and interviews.The results indicate that a number of guidelines favour the user experience when it comes to a mobile interface for finding information. This includes simplifying and prioritizing the tasks for the users to reduce the cognitive load. Concrete guidelines are presented for click target areas, location tracking, horizontal scrolling and functionality for changing text size area.