Developing an instrument to assess the impact of

Developing an instrument to assess the impact of attitude and social norms on user selection of an interface design: a repertory grid approach Willem-Paul Brinkman Steve Love

Topics § Research Motivation § Repertory Grid Analysis – initial instrument § Survey – validation instrument § Attitude, Social Norm and Design Selection § Conclusions & Future Research

Motivation Ultimate aim is to understand why people select a specific design for their device.

Motivation User Personality Intention of selecting a specific type of design Because of colour or theme § However, correlations were relatively small (Brinkman and Fine, 2005) § A less direct approach is needed as users might have different criteria to evaluate a design.

Motivation Attitude towards selecting a specific design type User Personality Relative importance Intention of selecting a specific type of design Subjective Norm Adoption of Theory of Reason Action (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980)

Motivation Research questions 1. What criteria do people use to evaluate a design? 2. What impact do attitude and social norm have on the selection of a design?

Motivation Different social context 1. Public application (mobile phone)? 2. Private application (PC multimedia player)?

Motivation Aim - Develop two evaluation instruments to assess people’s attitude and social norm towards: 1. Mobile phone 2. PC Multimedia Player Skins First question: what criteria do people use to evaluate a phone or Multimedia Player Skin?

Repertory Grid Analysis § Personal Construct Theory: Everyone interprets (or constructs) events and their universe differently. § Constructs are bipolar, for example to describe friends: easygoing versus tense, reliable versus unreliable. etc § Repertory Grid Analysis: a method to elicit these specific constructs. George Kelly

Repertory Grid Analysis General Procedure § Split up triad into 2 groups § Label the groups § Rate the object on construct § Create Grid

Repertory Grid Analysis General Procedure § Split up triad into 2 groups § Label the groups § Rate the object on construct § Create Grid Male Female

Repertory Grid Analysis General Procedure § Split up triad into 2 groups § Label the groups § Rate the object on construct § Create Grid Male Female

Repertory Grid Analysis General Procedure § Split up triad into 2 groups § Label the groups § Rate the object on construct § Create Grid § Looking for similarities between the constructs § Apply a Factor Analysis

Repertory Grid Analysis Method § Participants § Material § Procedure § 20 Participants § Brunel University Students or Staff members § 10 males, 10 females § Mean age of 26. 5 years (SD = 4. 84)

Repertory Grid Analysis Method § Participants § Material § Procedure Photo of 15 mobile phones taken from Mobile Digest news website.

Repertory Grid Analysis Method § Participants § Material § Procedure Screen prints from 15 skins taken from earlier study (Brinkman and Fine, 2005)

Repertory Grid Analysis Method § Participants § Material § Procedure § Two sessions: Mobile phone and Skins § Sequence of the sessions was counterbalanced § 10 randomly drawn triads, with no repeating triads § Afterwards rating the phone and skins on the 10 constructs § Total interview took around 2 hours

Repertory Grid Analysis § Data § Rules § Mobile Phone § Skins § 200 mobile phone and 200 skin constructs § Factor Analysis used principal-component extraction method and varimax rotation § Aim -> to identify common constructs themes used by multiple participants.

Repertory Grid Analysis § Data § Rules § Mobile Phone § Skins Selection criteria to select component 1. Factor loadings (correlations) below 0. 69 were ignored. 2. Components should have constructs loading from at least 5 different participants 3. A clear semantic relationship between the labels of the construct should exist.

Repertory Grid Analysis § Data § Rules § Mobile Phone § Skins Appearance of the mobile phone 3 Components / dimensions

Repertory Grid Analysis § Data § Rules § Mobile Phone § Skins 4 Components / Dimensions

Survey § § § Aim Procedure Participants Analysis Results Validate the scales obtained from the Repertory Gird Analysis

Survey § § § Aim Procedure Participants Analysis Results To evaluate the middle mobile phone/skin with the scales provided

Survey § § § Aim Procedure Participants Analysis Results § § § 156 students of the School of Information Systems, Computing and Mathematics (Brunel, UK) Average 23. 6 years (SD = 4. 79) 57 female, 75 male (24 did not report gender)

Survey § § § Aim Procedure Participants Analysis Results § § § Reliability analysis to examine the internal consistency of the scales within dimension Dimension “Reliability” for mobile phone removed Cronbach’s alpha < 0. 7 Factor Analysis Component with Eigen value > 1 Scales loading > 0. 7

Survey § § § Aim Procedure Participants Analysis Results Scales for Mobile Phones Scales for Multimedia Player skins

Attitude, Social Norm and Design Selection Second question: What impact do attitude and social norm have on the selection of a design? Attitude towards selecting a specific design type Additional information collecting in Grid interviews Subjective Norm Intention of selecting a specific type of design

Attitude, Social Norm and Design Selection § § Attitude Social Norm Intention Results § § § The evaluation (e) of a skin/phone on a scale. The importance of an evaluation scale (w). For me, having a skin that is “explaining”, or that is associated with this is? Bad Good

Attitude, Social Norm and Design Selection § § Attitude Social Norm Intention Results § § Their belief (b) on how peers, family members, or authority figures would their (participants) phone or skin to score on a construct. Their willingness (g) to comply with the peers, family members, or authority figure.

Attitude, Social Norm and Design Selection § § Attitude Social Norm Intention Results § § § Behavioural intention to select a skin or mobile phone I would try this on my media player? I intend to obtain the following mobile phone? unlikely

Attitude, Social Norm and Design Selection § § Attitude Social Norm Intention Results Social Norm has an impact on phone selection, but not skin selection. Phone (public) Skin (private) Mean (partial) correlation. *p. <. 05. **p<. 01.

Conclusions Research questions 1. What criteria do people use to evaluate a design? 1. Mobile phone: Gender, Ease of Use and Sophistication 2. Multimedia Player skins: Stimulation and Ease 2. What impact do attitude and social norm have on the selection of a design? • Social Norm has an impact on phone (public device) selection, but not Multimedia Player (private device) selection.

Further research User properties User Personality Gender Attitude towards selecting a specific design type Relative importance Subjective Norm Intention of selecting a specific type of design

Questions Thanks for your attention