Comparative Evaluation of Human-Computer Interfaces : Convergence between Plasticity and Creativity for the Quality of Human-Computer Interaction
2021.
Résumé
In this thesis we are interested in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) evaluation, more specifically in the approach of comparative evaluations. The literature sees them as an asset in increasing the quantity and quality of feedback in evaluations, thereby improving the quality of the HCI.However, producing alternative HCIs for comparative evaluations is expensive in the absence of tools for automatically generating these alternatives.The aim of the thesis is to automate the production of alternative HCIs in order to accelerate the convergence towards a quality one. This involves defining the transformations to be applied to an initial HCI to generate the best alternative, e.g, the one which placed next to the initial HCI, will allow to collect, as efficiently as possible, feedback inclined to improve the quality of the HCI. The alternative HCI could become the reference one to iteratively converge to towards the final HCI.To meet this objective, we first raised the question of whether or not to transform the HCI: would a change in materially be sufficient ? To this end, we explored the path of video alternatives. We elaborated an experimental study were we asked different participants to evaluate a HCI presented by both means successively :a paper prototype and video prototype. The results indicate that using the paper prototype allowed the participants to focus on the features offered by the system and criticized mainly it’s utility. Using the video prototype allowed the participants to focus more on the interaction with the system and criticized mainly it’s usability. Also, the combined use of the two prototypes, paper and film, enriches the results of the evaluation. However, the feedback collected were limited to the proposed HCI without alternative suggestions.We then studied the transformation of the HCI and, inspired by DesignScape, we questioned the minor or major character that these transformations had to have for an effective comparative evaluation. Based on the CAMELEON reference framework(CRF), we identified three possible levels of abstraction to anchor the transformations of an initial HCI: user tasks, the abstract UI and the concrete UI. Transformations at the first two levels are considered major changes. Changes at the level of the concrete UI is considered minor with regard to their depth in CRF.We carried out an experimental study in which three groups of participants compared an initial HCI with an alternative one presenting respectively a transformation within the task model, the abstract UI and the concrete UI. The study shows that user’s feedback were the most nourished in quality and quantity when the comparative evaluation implies the use of two HCIs presenting a variation in terms of the AUI.In the perspective of an automatic generation of alternatives, we then defined a set of transformation rules of the abstract UI consisting in modifying the navigation without changing the presentation of the elementary workspaces. We implemented these rules in GRA:FITI, a tool for automatic generation of alternative HCIs. GRA:FITI automatically generates three HCIs from an initial HCI that reduce the cost of global navigation, i.e., navigation between the major workspaces of the HMI, and/or local navigation, i.e., navigation within the elementary workspaces of the HCI. The experimental evaluation of GRA:FITI shows that: (1)GRA:FITI helps the designer to obtain relevant feedback on their initial HCI through comparative evaluations when using the alternative ones generated by the tool, (2)GRA:FITI can serve as a source of inspiration for HCI design.In summary, the thesis brings forward two contributions:(1)it defines the type of trans- formation to be applied to an HCI in order to generate an alternative one for efficient comparative evaluations and it proposes a set of rules for this transformation.(2)It proposes GRA:FITI, a tool for automatically generate this type of alternatives.