This work describes the iterative design and development of a Virtual Reality (VR) tool intended to explore how immersive technologies can support autistic adolescents when facing everyday situations characterised by uncertainty. We report the results of a co-design workshop with four psychologists specialised in neurodevelopmental intervention, which led to the creation of storyboards about uncertainty in a supermarket context. Results include sensory and social considerations in the simulation of uncertainty, as well as coping strategies and design implications for virtual environments with potential clinical relevance. These storyboards were used to develop a mid-fidelity prototype of a VR system. We then invited six autistic adolescents (aged 10-18) to interact with the prototype and act as expert advisors. Feedback data were gathered through semi-structured interviews and field observations. Our findings reveal that designing for autonomy in VR experiences is shaped by tensions related to individual, social, and interactive aspects. This work contributes to research on designing VR tools for autistic people by providing critical reflections on autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

Automatic systems are increasingly used to assess the originality of responses in creative tasks. They offer a potential solution to key limitations of human assessment (cost, fatigue, and subjectivity), but there is preliminary evidence of a self-preference bias. Accordingly, automatic systems tend to prefer outcomes that are more closely related to their style, rather than to the human one. In this paper, we investigated how Large Language Models (LLMs) align with human raters in assessing the originality of responses in a divergent thinking task. We analysed 4,813 responses to the Alternate Uses Task produced by higher and lower creative humans and ChatGPT-4o. Human raters were two university students who underwent intensive training. Machine raters were two specialised systems fine-tuned on AUT responses and corresponding human ratings (OCSAI and CLAUS) and ChatGPT-4o, which was prompted with the same instructions as human raters. Results confirmed the presence of a self-preference bias in LLMs. Automatic systems tended to privilege artificial responses. However, this self-preference bias disappeared when the analyses controlled for the idea elaboration. We discuss theoretical and methodological implications of these findings by highlighting future directions for research on creativity assessment.

The application of generative artificial intelligence in Creativity Support Tools (CSTs) presents the challenge of interfacing two black boxes: the user’s mind and the machine engine. According to Artificial Cognition, this challenge involves theories, methods, and constructs developed to study human creativity. Consistently, the paper investigated the relationship between semantic networks organisation and idea originality in Large Language Models. Data was collected by administering a set of standardised tests to ChatGPT-4o and 81 psychology students, divided into higher and lower creative individuals. The expected relationship was confirmed in the comparison between ChatGPT-4o and higher creative humans. However, despite having a more rigid network, ChatGPT-4o emerged as more original than lower creative humans. We attributed this difference to human motivational processes and model hyperparameters, advancing a research agenda for the study of artificial creativity. In conclusion, we illustrate the potential of this construct for designing and evaluating CSTs.

Ideology is power exerted by language, whether generated by humans or machines.It manifests in the biases produced by Large Language Models (LLMs), reflecting power relations between users and providers.Following this assumption, we engaged in an artistic critique of how ChatGPT produces ideology.We conducted two experiential workshops with 20 artists, analysing their reflections and interactions through ethnographic inquiry and formal linguistic analysis grounded in Thompson's account of ideology.The artists reported that both commercial goals and debiasing efforts constrain artistic expression, reinforcing dominant cultural values.To support critical engagement, we introduce a framework that maps recurring linguistic patterns in ChatGPT outputs to ideological modes of operation.This framework offers HCI practitioners an analytical tool to interrogate the socio-political implications of LLMs in design contexts.Our findings highlight the role of artists as critical agents in socio-technical transitions and call for interdisciplinary approaches to language technology critique.

Imagining the future of HRI is crucial for anticipating ethical, social, and technological challenges. This paper proposes a Speculative News workshop procedure to engage high school students in discussion and reflection while creating the front page of a newspaper published in 2125. Results from 40 participants explored robotic imaginaries highlighting societal issues, human attitudes toward robots, and technological feasibility. The results open questions that expand HRI knowledge beyond artefacts and deep into societies. In conclusion, we reflect on how Speculative News can foster participatory and inclusive design.

ABSTRACT The integration of Generative AI into artistic practices is not only expanding the possibilities for creative expression but also challenging foundational concepts such as agency and authorship. Combining Agential Realism and Speech Act Theory, this paper presents a case study involving three internationally recognised artists with extensive experience using text and image-based models. It combines in-depth interviews with critical readings of selected artworks to explore how generative AI Art emerges from the intra-actions between artists, data, and algorithms. Our contribution unfolds along two complementary directions. Firstly, we engage with epistemological debates by conceptualising agency and authorship as relational and distributed phenomena. Secondly, we challenge the notion of AI as a mere tool and advocate for design approaches that foreground shared authorship. By focusing on studio-level practices, this paper offers situated insights into artist–AI interaction, expands our understanding of de-individualised knowledge production, and points toward systems that support responsible co-creation.

The application of Machine Learning is driven by the techno–capitalist struggle for productivity across various domains, including the creative industry. Sociological research has demonstrated how technology–induced temporality introduces challenges at the individual and societal levels. Art creativity conflicts with speed and mass production. This paper describes Isotta, a critical artefact combining a Mignon typewriter and a Language Model to spark discussion about ML–induced acceleration. Fourteen artists evaluated Isotta in an interview study, and semiotics was used as the analytical lens. Results exposed ideological assumptions around the consequences of technology in the writing realm. We discuss these insights in the context of interactive design in times of techno–capitalistic acceleration. Our findings highlight the significance of temporal factors in designing generative writing interactions and underscore how complex societal challenges can be approached in design through the contrast–eliciting property that outdated technologies offer when juxtaposed with contemporary technologies.

Critical data studies denounce that heteronormative formalisations of sex/gender identity obscure queer lives from datasets and computational processes. Since sex/gender categories cannot convey nonbinarity and multiplicity, this project addresses the inherent tension between queerness and systematisation with an anticategorical quantitative visual approach, combining psychometric scales with visualisations of the gender spectrum. Indeed, using queer and feminist methodologies, we propose a new data structure resulting from the codesign of an interactive visualisation of the gender spectrum, made in an iterative dialogue with gender-diverse people. Our contribution is twofold: an inclusive data structure for the self-assessment of sex/gender identity, and an interactive visualisation, acting as a critical design object, educational and counselling tool, and basis for data collection, annotation, and analysis. Although this project could both empower and harm sexual minorities, its originality is seeing nonbinarity and multiplicity not as appendices to a normative system, but as queering design principles.

This paper explores the development of a touch-sensitive interactive 3D central console for vehicles aimed at simplifying access to tasks unrelated to driving, such as adjusting seats and controlling music. We investigated three console designs with front surface angles of 45°, 90° and 135°. The initial study assessed how users interact with these three prototypes. Subsequently, we examined the ease with which users could reach across the different shapes. Additionally, we conducted a gesture elicitation study styled on guessability with the 135° model, focusing on user interaction with four applications: a radial menu, a 2D menu, car seat adjustments, and map navigation. Summarizing, this work aims to create a central console that is ergonomic, minimalist, and utilizes surface gestures, setting a new standard for future car interiors.

Large Language Models (LLMs) are sparking debates about creativity, intellectual property, and artistic integrity. This paper focuses on creativity, defined as consensual agreement among domain experts. It presents an inductive analysis of seven semi-structured interviews with professional playwrights who engaged in a longitudinal project with the aim of writing a theatre script using commercial systems. Overall, participants regarded LLMs as unsuitable for playwrighting. However, they enjoyed the experience and identified utility for editorial tasks and brainstorming. A significant obstacle was associated with the politics embedded in LLMs. Not only did these systems avoid a language that could offend sensibilities, but they also refused to engage in taboos and conflicts, which are the core of dramaturgy. Other system features (speed, exploitation, and unpredictability) were sometimes considered conducive and sometimes detrimental to creativity. Participants experienced difficulties and tried to build common ground by trial and error. Often, this strategy evolved into role play: the playwright instructed the LLM to enact characters. The interaction provided hints of inspiration and fostered suspension of disbelief and ontological reflection. However, it often led to technology rejection. Comparing and contrasting our insights with related work, we conclude by opening new directions for research at the boundaries of HCI and AI.

The design of robust and trustworthy Generative AI (GenAI) requires a deep understanding of the agencies emerging from human interactions with them. To contribute to this goal, we retrospectively studied an art project involving a visual artist, a computer scientist, an artistic director, and a generative model (GPT-2). The model was fine-tuned with trip reports describing the experience of eating psychedelic mushrooms. Building on agential realism, we analysed the co-performance between the artist and the model as their agency moved along the choreographer-performer continuum. Results reveal ontological surprises, leading to the proposal of entangled authorship to de-individualise the production of knowledge from a More Than Human perspective. The paper illustrates how art can expose different forms of relationships, challenging the idea of GenAI as just a tool that simplifies or replaces human labour. We conclude by emphasising the transformational potential of GenAI for novel modes of engagement between humans and machines.

Abstract According to recent legislative initiatives, non-consensual pornography is a crime in several countries and social media providers have a duty to provide their users easy to use mechanisms to report abuses. In this paper, we analyse the state of the art of the interfaces for reporting non-consensual pornography from the victim’s perspective. Firstly, we analysed 45 content sharing platforms where aggressors might post non-consensual pornography. The analysis identified three distinct interaction styles for reporting the crime: Scriptum (a text-field where the user verbally describes the abuse), Bonam (a multilayered menu that includes a correct option), and Malam (a multilayered menu that does not include a correct option). Secondly, we conducted a within-subject study to evaluate the experience elicited by these interaction styles. Participants (N = 39) were given a scenario and asked to report six blurred images as non-consensual pornography using a medium-fidelity prototype. The results exposed complex trade-offs between clarity, efficiency, and distress among the different interaction styles. These trade-offs open foundational research directions transcending boundaries between human-computer interaction and multimedia studies and interfacing computer science research with the law.

Active aging technologies are increasingly designed to support an active lifestyle. However, the way in which they are designed can raise different barriers to acceptance of and use by older adults. Their designers can adopt a negative stereotype of aging. Thorough understanding of user requirements is central to this problem. This paper investigates user requirements for technologies that encourage an active lifestyle and provide older people with the means to self-manage their physical, mental, and emotional health. This requires consideration of the person and the sociotechnical context of use. We describe our work in collecting and analyzing older adults’ requirements for a technology which enables an active lifestyle. The main contribution of the paper is a model of user requirements for inclusive technology for older people.

Children's role in the design of new technology has been widely investigated. Recently, the research focus has shifted, from the technology they help create, towards what children gain by participating in design workshops. This paper intercepts this line of research. It reports on a design workshop with 27 children, aged from 11 to 14 years old, ideating, programming and prototyping smart objects for their town park. Data were gathered in relation to children's beliefs, before and after the workshop, and in relation to their understanding of design, after the workshop. The analysis of the gathered data suggests that the workshop positively affected children's beliefs and understanding of design, giving indications for future work concerning design as means of empowerment.

Gender is a major variable affecting identity and life opportunities from a young age. Our research aims to explore the persistence of gender stereotypes in multimedia stories created by children with the final purpose of attenuating this stereotypical thinking by proposing new processes and tools. The paper investigates the following research question: how can gender stereotypes be detected in the stories produced by children with Digital StoryTelling? We addressed this issue by analyzing 23 multimedia stories created by 83 children, aged 11-12 years. The main contribution of our work is an evaluation methodology to detect gender stereotypes.

Playful technology has the potential to support physical activity (PA) among wheelchair users, but little is known about design considerations for this audience, who experience significant access barriers. In this paper, we lever-age the Integrated Behavioural Model (IBM) to understand wheelchair users' perspectives on PA, technology, and play.First, we present findings from an interview study with eight physically active wheelchair users. Second, we build on the interviews in a survey that received 44 responses from a broader group of wheelchair users. Results show that the anticipation of positive experiences was the strongest predictor of engagement with PA, and that accessibility concerns act as barriers both in terms of PA participation and technology use. We present four design goals - emphasizing enjoyment,involving others, building knowledge and enabling flexibility - to make our findings actionable for researchers and designers wishing to create accessible playful technology to support PA.

Effortless reading remains an issue for many Web users, despite a large number of readability guidelines available to designers. This paper presents a study of manual and automatic use of 39 readability guidelines in webpage evaluation. The study collected the ground-truth readability for a set of 50 webpages using eye-tracking with average and dyslexic readers (n = 79). It then matched the ground truth against human-based (n = 35) and automatic evaluations. The results validated 22 guidelines as being connected to readability. The comparison between human-based and automatic results also revealed a complex framework: algorithms were better or as good as human experts at evaluating webpages on specific guidelines - particularly those about low-level features of webpage legibility and text formatting. However, multiple guidelines still required a human judgment related to understanding and interpreting webpage content. These results contribute a guideline categorization laying the ground for future design evaluation methods.

This paper presents a model to codesign interpretively flexible artefacts. We present the case study of Beatfield, a multimodal system that allows users to control audiovisual material by means of tangible interaction. The design of the system was coauthored by individuals with different background and interests to encourage a range of difference interpretations. The capability of Beatfield to foster multiple interpretations was evaluated in a qualitative study with 21 participants. Elaborating on the outcome of this study, we present a new design model that can be used to stimulate heterogeneous interpretations of interactive artefacts.

Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) of low visual complexity tend to have higher aesthetics, usability and accessibility, and result in higher user satisfaction. Despite a few authors recently used or studied visual complexity, the concept of visual complexity still needs to be better defined for the use in HCI research and GUI design, with its underlying aspects systematized and operationalized, and different measures validated. This paper reviews the aspects of GUI visual complexity and operationalizes four aspects with nine computation-based measures in total. Two user studies validated the measures on two types of stimuli - webpages (study 1, n = 55) and book pages (study 2, n = 150) - with two user groups, dyslexics (people with reading difficulties) and typical readers. The same complexity aspects could be expected to determine complexity perception for both GUI types, whereas different complexity aspects could be expected to determine complexity perception for dyslexics, relative to typical readers. However, the studies showed little to no difference between dyslexics and average readers, whereas web pages did differ from book pages in what aspects made them seem complex. It was not the intergroup differences, but the stimulus type that defined criteria to judge visual complexity. Future research and visual design could rely on the visual complexity aspects outlined in this paper.

Reading is fundamental to interactive-system use, but around 800 million of people might struggle with it due to literacy difficulties. Few websites are designed for high readability, as readability remains an underinvestigated facet of User Experience. Existing readability guidelines have multiple issues: they are too many or too generic, poorly worded, and often lack cognitive grounding. This paper developed a set of 61 readability guidelines in a series of workshops with design and dyslexia experts. A user study with dyslexic and average readers further narrowed the 61-guideline set down to a core set of 12 guidelines -- an acceptably small set to keep in mind while designing. The core-set guidelines address reformatting -- such as using larger fonts and narrower content columns, or avoiding underlining and italics -- and may well aply to the interactive system other than websites.

Critical design is gaining momentum in interaction design, yet little CSCW research has focused on articulating the cooperative potentials of critical design artefacts. We address this gap by reflecting upon a design project aimed at overturning the prevailing narrative regarding dyslexia in Italy. The adversarial propositions embedded in our critical design artefacts challenged the description of dyslexia as a learning disorder putting forward the view of a learning difference. These artefacts demonstrated their capacity to bridge heterogeneous social worlds (those of teachers, children, and parents) into one cooperative entity and mobilise cooperative activism. The contribution to CSCW is two-fold. Firstly, we introduce the cooperative potentials of critical design artefacts; secondly, we propose critical design as a strategy for researchers engaging with cooperative activism.

We present an empirical study on facilitating the adoption of user-centred design (UCD) in small Agile companies. To this end, we introduced a curated set of qualitative design practices in an Agile organisation, engaging developers in a lightweight series of workshops. Our results suggest that the approach followed enhanced internal communication and promoted a concrete shift towards a more user-centred perspective. However, the presence of a predominant non-Agile customer seems to have limited potential benefits.

In this paper, we present a close reading of work in ubicomp of applications for older people. Starting from three lines of enquiry defined in the inaugural issue of this journal, we discuss how ubicomp research has presented the relationship between technologies and older users. We base our reasoning on a review of papers published in Personal and Ubiquitous Computing (1997–2014). The lines of enquiry refer to paradigms (functional vs. sociotechnical), users (stereotype and involvement), and contexts (indoor and/or outdoor). These themes address the presentation of SUITCASE project (SUstainable Integrated & Territorial CAre SErvices). This is a two-year research on care services for older citizens within the smart home construct. We develop an initial framework that not only provides a cohesive view of technologies for older people, but also serves as a salient guideline for reflective design which extends beyond the target population. This framework may also address future design projects, funding schemes, and editorial policies.

Almost any search on Google Play returns numerous app suggestions. The user quickly skims through the list and picks a few apps for a closer look. The vast majority of the apps regardless of how well-made they are go unnoticed. App icons uniquely represent each app in Google Play and help apps to get noticed, as we demonstrate in the paper. We reviewed the visual qualities of icons that could make them noticeable and likable. We then computationally measured two of the qualities visual saliency and complexity for 930 icons and linked the computed scores to app popularity (the number of app ratings and installs). The measures explained 38% of variance in the number of ratings, if app genre was accounted for. Not only does such result assert the link between icon properties and app popularity, it also highlights the automatic prediction of app popularity as a promising research direction. HCI researchers, app creators and Google Play (or another mobile marketplace) will benefit from the paper insights on what antecedes app success and how to measure the antecedents.

The integration of user-centred design and Agile development is becoming increasingly common in companies and appears promising. However, it may also present some critical points, or communication breakdowns, such as a variable interpretation of user involvement, a mismatch in the value of documentation, and a misalignment in iterations. We refine these themes, emerging from both literature and previous fieldwork, by analysing a case study performed in an IT company that adopts both software engineering approaches, and we further extend the framework with a new theme related to task ownership. We argue that communication breakdowns can become focal points to drive action and decision for establishing an organisational context acknowledging the value of user involvement: to this end, we suggest the adoption of design thinking and the active engagement of the customer in embracing its values.

People prefer attractive interfaces. Designers strive to outmatch competitors, and create apps and websites that stand out. However, significant expenses on design are unaffordable to small companies; instead, they could adopt automatic tools of interface aesthetics evaluation, a cheaper strategy to good design. This paper describes an important step towards such a tool; it presents eight automatic metrics of graphical user interface (GUI) aesthetics. We tested the metrics in two exploratory studies -- on desktop webpages (N = 62) and on iPhone apps (N = 53) -- and found them to function on both GUI types and for both immediate (150ms exposure) and deliberate (4s exposure) aesthetics impressions. Our best-fit regression models explained up to 49% of variance in webpage aesthetics and up to 32% (if app genre is considered) of variance in iPhone app aesthetics. These results confirm past results and suggest the metrics are valid and reliable enough to be widely discussed, and possibly, to be embedded in our prospective GUI evaluation tool, tLight.

Designers strive for enjoyable user experience (UX) and put a significant effort into making graphical user interfaces (GUI) both usable and beautiful. Our goal is to minimize their effort: with this purpose in mind, we have been studying automatic metrics of GUI qualities. These metrics could enable designers to iterate their designs more quickly. We started from the psychological findings that people tend to prefer simpler things. We then assumed visual complexity determinants also determine visual aesthetics and outlined eight of them as belonging to three dimensions: information amount (visual clutter and color variability), information organization (symmetry, grid, ease-of-grouping and prototypicality), and information discriminability (contour density and figure-ground contrast). We investigated five determinants (visual clutter, symmetry, contour density, figure-ground contrast and color variability) and proposed six associated automatic metrics. These metrics take screenshots of GUI as input and can thus be applied to any type of GUI. We validated the metrics through a user study: we gathered the ratings of immediate impressions of GUI visual complexity and aesthetics, and correlated them with the output of the metrics. The output explained up to 51% of aesthetics ratings and 50% of complexity ratings. This promising result could be further extended towards the creation of tLight, our automatic GUI evaluation tool.

This one-day workshop is going to bring together top researchers and practitioners working in the area of interactive e-books for children. The goal of the workshop is defining key directions for future research in the design process and implementation of this kind of books. The workshop critically explores opportunities and challenges for making interactive e-books effective for children's learning and entertainment.

This paper investigates general and individual evaluations of User Experience (UX) with interactive web sites. A series of studies investigate user judgment on web sites with different interactivity levels over repeated exposures. The more interactive websites produced more positive affect, had better design quality ratings, which improved with exposure, and were preferred. Differences between the more interactive sites indicated overall UX was influenced by users' preferences for interactive styles, with both sites having enthusiast, potential adopter, and non-adopter users. The implications for models and frameworks of UX are discussed.

An accurate model of human behaviour is crucial when planning robot motion in human environments. The Social Force Model (SFM) is such a model, having parameters that control both deterministic and stochastic elements. We have constructed an efficient motion planning algorithm by embedding the SFM in a control loop that determines higher level objectives and reacts to environmental changes. Low level predictive modelling is provided by the SFM fed by sensors; high level logic is provided by statistical model checking. To parametrise and improve our motion planning algorithm, we have conducted experiments to consider typical human interactions in crowded environments. We have identified a number of behavioural patterns which may be explicitly incorporated in the SFM to enhance its predictive power. In this paper we describe the results of these experiments and how we parametrise the SFM.

End-User Development (EUD) can be exploited on the Web, where users have the opportunity to create niche “Web Mashup” applications as a means to address their long tail of situational needs in different domains of application. In this paper, we describe the design and evaluation of NaturalMash, an innovative EUD system for mashups. NaturalMash provides a high level of expressive power while it is still usable by non-professional users. This clearly distinguishes NaturalMash from existing mashup EUD tools that are either too limited or highly specialized for inexperienced users. The NaturalMash user interface efficiently combines different techniques such as live programming, natural language programming, What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG), and Programming by Demonstration (PbD). The design of NaturalMash adopts a formative evaluation approach, and has completed two design and evaluation iterations. The paper reports the results of the last formative evaluation and discusses the implications of the findings. The results are promising and suggest that the proposed system has a short and gentle learning curve and enables even non-professional users to rapidly build useful mashups.

In this paper we propose and evaluate UX_Mate, a non-invasive system for the automatic assessment of User eXperience (UX). In addition, we contribute a novel database of annotated and synchronized videos of interactive behavior and facial expressions. UX_Mate is a modular system which tracks facial expressions of users, interprets them based on pre-set rules, and generates predictions about the occurrence of a target emotional state, which can be linked to interaction events. The system simplifies UX evaluation providing an indication of event occurrence. UX_Mate has several advantages compared to other state of the art systems: easy deployment in the user's natural environment, avoidance of invasive devices, and extreme cost reduction. The paper reports a pilot and a validation study on a total of 46 users, where UX_Mate was used for identifying interaction difficulties. The studies show encouraging results that open possibilities for automatic real-time UX evaluation in ecological environments.

Large interactive displays are increasingly used in public spaces. Yet, it is still a challenge to understand how people behave when faced with such displays in their real life, not only when they are used for entertainment (or advertising), but also when they mediate more purposeful tasks. Do people feel shy? Are they willing to interact? Are they satisfied with the services offered and will they come back to use them again? To answer such questions, these systems have to be evaluated in the field so as to understand their actual impact on users in the real life. This paper first introduces an initial evaluation framework, aimed at highlighting some of the variables involved in understanding the impact of large display installations. Then, it applies the framework to analyze users' behavior and their experience with a large display installed at an international conference. Results highlighted that people showed greater interest in those services that, despite a lower appeal, supported them in carrying out useful tasks.

The Third International Workshop on end user development for services (EUD4Services) focuses on the challenges faced by researchers and practitioners in applying End User Development ideas and principles to the area of service-oriented software design and construction. The topic is a natural development following on from two previous workshops which charted the territory of existing tools and research systems, and created a community of researchers and practitioners working in the area. This year edition aims to define a shared research agenda which can direct future work acting as a catalyst of joint effort towards the establishment of EUD for services.

Over the last few years, several services and platforms for scientific production and dissemination have appeared (e.g. scholarly search engines, digital libraries, blogs, social networks, and conference management systems). Yet, these services are really fragmented and, in some cases, lack critical

Conversational agents are attributed humanlike characteristics; in particular, they are often assumed to have a gender. There is evidence that gender sets up expectations that have an impact on user experiences with agents. The objective of this paper is to explore gender affordances of conversational agents. Our examination takes a holistic approach to the analysis of the application of gender stereotypes to nine chatterbots: six embodied (three male and three female), two disembodied (male and female), and a robot embodiment. Building on social psychology research, we test the persistence of gender stereotypes in the selection of conversation topics and in the elicitation of disinhibition and verbal abuse. Our study is based on quantitative textual analysis of interaction logs. A dictionary of English sexual slang and derogatory terms was developed for this study. Results show that gender stereotypes tend to affect interaction more at the relational (style) level then at the referential (content) level of conversation. People attribute negative stereotypes to female-presenting chatterbots more often than they do to male-presenting chatterbots, and female-presenting chatterbots are more often the objects of implicit and explicit sexual attention and swear words. We conclude by calling for a more informed analysis of user interactions that considers the full range of user interactions.

The importance of cultural heritage in forging a sense of identity is becoming increasingly evident. Information and communication technologies have a great potential to promote a greater awareness and appreciation of cultural heritage. This article presents some findings on how mobile technology can be used to foster a better understanding of an archaeological site by reconstructing the ancient environment and life. Children aged 11--13 years old are the target of our research. To motivate and engage them, a pervasive educational game has been developed and implemented in Explore! , a system aimed at supporting children exploring sites of cultural interest. Special attention has been devoted to the design of a soundscape that may improve players’ navigation in degraded physical environments and enrich their overall experience. A field study indicated that children judged their experience both useful and entertaining: not only did they enjoy playing the game, but they also learned historical notions and facts related to ancient Roman life. Contextual sounds were found to have a facilitating effect on space navigation, reducing the need for map reading and improving spatial orientation. This work provides insights into the design of educational games for use with cultural heritage and a model to enrich historical sites through the creation of soundscapes which can help visitors to navigate a site and feel its historical atmosphere.

We explore the possibility of creating an interactive system which can foster fantasy play in preschool children in a tabletop environment. This paper reports our experiences designing and testing two prototypes with young children aged 3-4 years old. In the first study, we focused on understanding the similarities and differences between the type of play afforded by real objects and virtual objects. In the second study, we focused on testing solutions for the interaction difficulties evinced in the first study to see how to provide an engaging experience for children. Data were collected by observing children while they played with the study materials. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used for data collection and analysis.

This paper reports the experimental studies we have performed to evaluate Explore!, an m-learning system that supports middle school students during a visit to an archaeological park. It exploits a learning technique called excursion-game, whose aim is to help students to acquire historical notions while playing and to make archaeological visits more effective and exciting. In order to understand the potentials and limitations of Explore!, our studies compare the experience of playing the excursion-game with and without technological support. The design and evaluation of Explore! have provided knowledge on the advantages and pitfalls of m-learning that may be instrumental in informing the current debate on e-learning.

Understanding the complexities of users' judgements and user experience is a prerequisite for informing HCI design. Current user experience (UX) research emphasises that, beyond usability, non-instrumental aspects of system quality contribute to overall judgement and that the user experience is subjective and variable. Based on judgement and decision-making theory, we have previously demonstrated that judgement of websites can be influenced by contextual factors. This paper explores the strength of such contextual influence by investigating framing effects on user judgement of website quality. Two experimental studies investigate how the presentation of information about a website influences the user experience and the relative importance of individual quality attributes for overall judgement. Theoretical implications for the emerging field of UX research and practical implications for design are discussed.

This paper presents a descriptive lexical analysis of spontaneous conversations between users and the 2005 Loebner prize winning chatterbot, Jabberwacky. The study was motivated in part by the suspicion that evidence in support of the Media Equation, especially in the field of conversational agents, was supported by incomplete data; too often omitted in its purview is the occurrence of unsavoury user responses. Our study shows that conversations with Jabberwacky often bring about the expression of negative verbal disinhibition. We discovered that 10% of the total stems in the corpus reflected abusive language, and approximately 11% of the sample addressed hard-core sex. Users were often rude and violated the conversation maxims of manner, quantity, and relevance. Also particularly pronounced in the conversations was a persistent need of the user to define the speakers’ identities (human vs. machine). Users were also curious to understand and test the cognitive capabilities of the chatterbot. Our analysis indicates that the Media Equation may need qualifying, that users treat computers that talk, less as they do people and more as they might treat something not quite an object yet not quite human.

“You see, there’s a primal joy in hitting a thing in motion. It’s one of the oldest pleasures there is. Something moves, boo, you wing it. Beast, bird or human, the thing to do is to knock it down. It’s primal, Davy. It’s basic to the origin of the species.” – Don DeLillo, Americana Coming across an unknown creature generates anxiety. Its autonomy gives rise to fears; its agency requires vigilance. In the primitive world of predators and prey, it is wise to be leery of anything that moves and to learn as quickly as possible whether a creature is aggressive or possesses dangerous weapons of self-defence. What better way to find that out then to throw a rock at it from a safe distance to see how it reacts and what it is capable of doing to protect itself. Testing, teasing, and poking creatures is so crucial for human and animal survival that it is no wonder these behaviours are also pleasurable, as are play fighting and play chasing (for a review of the literature, see Aldis, 1975). Apparently an elementary predator–prey schema runs across cultures and most species (Lorenz, 1939).

The article introduces a framework for users' design quality judgments based on Adaptive Decision Making theory. The framework describes judgment on quality attributes (usability, content/functionality, aesthetics, customisation and engagement) with dependencies on decision making arising from the user's background, task and context. The framework is tested and refined by three experimental studies. The first two assessed judgment of quality attributes of websites with similar content but radically different designs for aesthetics and engagement. Halo effects were demonstrated whereby attribution of good quality on one attribute positively influenced judgment on another, even in the face of objective evidence to the contrary (e.g., usability errors). Users' judgment was also shown to be susceptible to framing effects of the task and their background. These appear to change the importance order of the quality attributes; hence, quality assessment of a design appears to be very context dependent. The third study assessed the influence of customisation by experiments on mobile services applications, and demonstrated that evaluation of customisation depends on the users' needs and motivation. The results are discussed in the context of the literature on aesthetic judgment, user experience and trade-offs between usability and hedonic/ludic design qualities.

A theoretical framework for assessing the attractiveness of websites based on Adaptive Decision Making theory is introduced. The framework was developed into a questionnaire and used to evaluate three websites which shared the same brand and topic but differed in aesthetic design. The DSchool site was favoured overall and was best for aesthetics and usability. The subjective ratings of the sites were in conflict with the subject-reported comments on usability problems. Subjects were given two scenarios for their preference. They changed their preference from the DSchool to the HCI Group's site for the more serious (PhD study) scenario; however, design background students remained loyal to the DSchool. The implications of framing and halo effects on users' judgement of aesthetics are discussed.

In this paper we describe an evaluation of two websites with the same content but different interface styles (traditional menu-based and interactive metaphors). A formative usability evaluation was carried out with heuristic assessment of aesthetics, and questionnaire assessment of aesthetics, content, information quality, usability and post-test memory. The study revealed that perception of information quality is affected by the interaction style implemented in the interface, in a manner resembling the halo effect in person perception. Implications for website design and evaluation are discussed.

Online shopping is the product of consumer assessment of the technological medium and the e-vendor. Previous research has evinced a number of interface features which are believed to be associated with trust building in e-commerce. In this paper we address issues of cross-cultural validity of these 'trust attributes' by comparing the relative importance given to them in two European nations (UK and Cyprus) which are characterized by different cultural values such as uncertainty avoidance (the way cultures deal with risk) and individualism/collectivism (the relative importance given to groups vs. individuals). A large-scale survey study suggested a strong cultural bias in the evaluation of trust attributes. The implications of these findings for interface design and localization are discussed.

This paper presents a method and results of an ethnographic study aimed at building an understanding of Automatic Teller Machine (ATM) adoption in Mumbai, India. The study combined field observations and semi-structured interviews (N=43) of early ATM adopters, bank customers who do not use ATMs, and people who used the ATM for the first time as part of our research. Data were analysed to identify specific cultural traits that may affect the adoption of ATMs in urban India. Results demonstrated the unique role of the cultural context in affecting users' expectations and behavioural possibilities, thus determining people's response to the machine. This led to the conclusion that an understanding of cultural biases and metaphors can facilitate technology diffusion and acceptance informing design localisation and supporting the development of strategies to motivate and train users.

Passwords are the almost universal authentication mechanism, even though they are basically flawed and cause problems for users due to poor memorability. Graphical methods of authentication have recently excited some interest but little is known about their actual efficacy. There are basically two types of graphical authentication mechanisms: recognition-based and location-based—also called visuo-spatial mechanisms. Whereas some kinds of recognition-based graphical authentication mechanisms have been evaluated by various researchers, there is still a need to investigate location-based graphical authentication mechanisms in a more rigorous fashion to determine whether they could be a viable alternative to traditional passwords for web usage. This paper discusses graphical authentication mechanisms in general and reports on the evaluation of one particular visuo-spatial mechanism, aimed at augmenting the password paradigm by providing a way to record passwords securely. Results and findings are presented, and conclusions drawn, some of which can also be applied to other types of visuo-spatial mechanisms. We also propose a set of metrics which can be used to measure the quality of web authentication mechanisms and apply these to a range of existing authentication mechanisms.

This paper describes some of the consumer-driven usability research conducted by NCR Self Service Strategic Solutions in the development of an understanding of usability and user acceptance of leading-edge biometrics verification techniques. We discuss biometric techniques in general and focus upon the usability phases and issues, associated with iris verification technology at the Automated Teller Machine (ATM) user interface. The paper concludes with a review of some of the major research issues encountered, and an outline of future work in the area.

It is indubitable that usability inspection of complex hypermedia is still an "art," in the sense that a great deal is left to the skills, experience, and ability of the inspectors. Training inspectors is difficult and often quite expensive. The Systematic Usability Evaluation (SUE) inspection technique has been proposed to help usability inspectors share and transfer their evaluation know-how, to simplify the hypermedia inspection process for newcomers, and to achieve more effective and efficient evaluation results. SUE inspection is based on the use of evaluation patterns, called abstract tasks, which precisely describe the activities to be performed by evaluators during inspection. This article highlights the advantages of this inspection technique by presenting its empirical validation through a controlled experiment. Two groups of novice inspectors were asked to evaluate a commercial hypermedia CD-ROM by applying the SUE inspection or traditional heuristic evaluation. The comparison was based on three major dimensions: effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction. Results indicate a clear advantage of the SUE inspection over the traditional inspection on all dimensions, demonstrating that abstract tasks are efficient tools to drive the evaluator's performance.

This paper addresses knowledge-based authentication systems in self-service technology, presenting the design and evaluation of the Visual Identification Protocol (VIP). The basic idea behind it is to use pictures instead of numbers as a means for user authentication. Three different authentication systems based on images and visual memory were designed and compared with the traditional Personal Identification Number (PIN) approach in a longitudinal study involving 61 users. The experiment addressed performance criteria and subjective evaluation. The study and associated design exploration revealed important knowledge about users, their attitudes towards and behaviour with novel authentication approaches using images. VIP was found to provide a promising and easy-to-use alternative to the PIN. The visual code is easier to remember, preferred by users and potentially more secure than the numeric code. Results also provided guidelines to help designers make the best use of the natural power of visual memory in security solutions.

In the usability inspection of complex hypermedia a great deal is left to the skills, experience, and ability of the inspectors. The SUE inspection technique has been proposed to help usability inspectors share and transfer their evaluation know-how, make it easier the hypermedia inspection process for newcomers, and achieve more effective and efficient evaluations. The SUE inspection is based on the use of evaluation patterns, called Abstract Tasks, which precisely describe the activities to be performed by evaluators during inspection. This paper presents an empirical validation of this inspection technique: two groups of novice inspectors have been asked to evaluate a commercial hypermedia CD-ROM applying the SUE inspection or the traditional heuristic evaluation technique. Results have shown a clear advantage of the SUE inspection over the heuristic evaluation, demonstrating that Abstract Tasks are efficient tools to drive evaluator's performance.

This paper examines user behavior during multimodal human-computer interaction (HCI). It discusses how pointing, natural language, and graphical layout should be integrated to enhance the usability of multimodal systems. Two experiments were run to study simulated systems capable of understanding written natural language and mouse-supported pointing gestures. Results allowed to: (a) develop a taxonomy of communication acts aimed at identifying targets; (b) determine the conditions under which specific referent identification strategies are likely to be produced; (c) suggest guidelines for designing effective multimodal interfaces; (d) show that performance is strongly influenced by interface graphical layout and by user expertise. Our study confirms the value of simulation as a tool for building HCI models and supports the basic idea that linguistic, visual, and motor cues can be integrated to favor effective multimodal communication.

Our ability to develop robust multimodal systems will depend on knowledge of the natural integration patterns that typify people's combined use of different input modes. To provide a foundation for theory and design, the present research analyzed multimodal interaction while people spoke and wrote to a simulated dynamic map system. Task analysis revealed that multimodal interaction occurred most frequently during spatial location commands, and with intermediate frequency during selection commands. In addition, microanalysis of input signals identified sequential, simultaneous, point-and-speak, and compound integration patterns, as well as data on the temporal precedence of modes and on inter-modal lags. In synchronizing input streams, the temporal precedence of writing over speech was a major theme, with pen input conveying location information first in a sentence. Linguistic analysis also revealed that the spoken and written modes consistently supplied complementary semantic information, rather than redundant. One long-term goal of this research is the development of predictive models of natural modality integration to guide the design of emerging multimodal architectures. Keywords multimodal interaction, integration and synchronization, speech and pen input, dynamic interactive maps, spatial location information, predictive modeling