Effect of User Sessions on the Heuristic Usability Method

Jehad Alqurni, Roobaea Alroobaea, Mohammed Alqahtani

Source Title: International Journal of Open Source Software and Processes (IJOSSP)9(1)

ISSN: 1942-3926|EISSN: 1942-3934|EISBN13: 9781522543985|DOI: 10.4018/IJOSSP.2018010104

MLA

Alqurni, Jehad, et al. "Effect of User Sessions on the Heuristic Usability Method." IJOSSP vol.9, no.1 2018: pp.62-81. http://doi.org/10.4018/IJOSSP.2018010104

APA

Alqurni, J., Alroobaea, R., & Alqahtani, M. (2018). Effect of User Sessions on the Heuristic Usability Method. International Journal of Open Source Software and Processes (IJOSSP), 9(1), 62-81. http://doi.org/10.4018/IJOSSP.2018010104

Chicago

Alqurni, Jehad, Roobaea Alroobaea, and Mohammed Alqahtani. "Effect of User Sessions on the Heuristic Usability Method," International Journal of Open Source Software and Processes (IJOSSP) 9, no.1: 62-81. http://doi.org/10.4018/IJOSSP.2018010104

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Abstract

Heuristic evaluation (HE) is a widely used method for assessing software systems. Several studies have sought to improve the effectiveness of HE by developing its heuristics and procedures. However, few studies have involved the end-user, and to the best of the authors' knowledge, no HE studies involving end-users with non-expert evaluators have been reported. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the impact of end-users on the results obtained by a non-expert evaluator within the HE process, and through that, to explore the number of usability problems and their severity. This article proposes introducing two sessions within the HE process: a user exploration session (UES-HE) and a user review session (URS-HE). The outcomes are compared with two solid benchmarks in the usability-engineering field: the traditional HE and the usability testing (UT) methods. The findings show that the end-user has a significant impact on non-expert evaluator results in both sessions. In the UES-HE method, the results outperformed all usability evaluation methods (UEMs) regarding the usability problems identified, and it tended to identify more major, minor, and cosmetic problems than other methods.