Call for Support: WebRadio is way in to looking at Customisation and User Behaviour

The PROSKIN Project is researching the effect that user interface skins have on interaction, specifically as to whether there are correlations between user profile and observable interactive behaviours. Proskin stands for PROfiled SKINs.

PhD student Nick Fine at Brunel University is looking at how giving the user the means to change their user interface may have significant impact upon the quality of interaction, even for apparently subtle cosmetic changes.

He says: 'The ability to re-skin or customise the user interface is fast becoming a common feature of many software applications and operating systems.

'Unfortunately for interface designers there are only very basic metrics available to them to determine the efficacy of their designs, for example number of downloads and user ratings. These metrics do not inform designers of how the interface is used and so evolution of user interfaces is slower and tends to be more qualitative in nature.'

He suggests that user interface skins are distributed in an almost 'waterfall' fashion with little or no feedback to designers because there is no feedback loop post internal testing and release into the context of use. His research aims to provide this feedback path so that user interfaces may evolve based upon quantitative evidence of use. 'I am looking into ways of defining and recording this interaction data so as to inform designers not only the nature of users but the nature of usage.'

To sign up for webradio and participate in his research, follow the link below.

Associated Link: The Proskin Project

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