These could help us think about how mobile apps/technology ... design. Part 1 (20 min). Rational ignorance occurs when the cost of educating oneself on an ...
Created by Dr Jim Ang for EL880 HCI for mobiles/week1
EL880 HCI for Mobiles Workshop: week 1 Critical thinking beyond technology: mobile HCI and economics Please work in pairs. HCI as a field is almost like a pick and mix of many other fields. Traditionally, HCI has borrowed various concepts, ideas and theories from cognitive science, anthropology, sociology, product design and ergonomics. Being able to understand theories or ideas from other relevant fields is very important for HCI researches and to a certain extend for interaction designers who wish to gain new perspective in innovative app design. In the lecture, we have discussed how ideas from economics (i.e. information asymmetry) could help us to explain certain human behaviour and problems faced by people. These could help us think about how mobile apps/technology could be designed to address some of these problems. Surprisingly, not much has been done in drawing theories and knowledge from economics in technology design. Part 1 (20 min) Rational ignorance occurs when the cost of educating oneself on an issue exceeds the potential benefit that the knowledge would provide. Example: given the amount of product/services choices there are, it is very easy to end up spending way too much time when researching to buy a product/service. For instance, when booking a hotel for a holiday, one could spend hours(cost) even the saving (benefit) might not be very significant. Two possible ways this problem can be solved: a) reduce the cost of research b) increase the benefit of research (try not to restrict your thinking about benefit to just money saved. What other benefits could you gain?) Discuss with your partner the following topics: a) exchange experiences in regards to “rational ignorance” when using hotel booking sites/apps, or other similar sites/apps. Perhaps you don’t experience this problem at all. In this case, try to discuss why. b) come up with TWO design ideas to address this issue. A free rider, in economics, refers to someone who benefits from resources, goods, or services without paying for the cost of the benefit.
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Created by Dr Jim Ang for EL880 HCI for mobiles/week1
Example: an online forum is a good public place to getting information. However, only few people contribute information, whilst most are free rider. How do we address this issue through better design? Discuss with your partner the following topics: a) how often do you contribute in an online forum (or wiki or product review sites). Why do you (not) contribute? b) come up with a least TWO design ideas to address this Part 2 (15 min) Information asymmetry deals with the study of decisions in transactions where one party has more or better information than the other. This problem is observed in various digital environments. For instance on Ebay, the sellers have more information about the items they are selling than the buyers. Please study Ebay carefully and list down at least TWO information asymmetry issues all users can encounter. Then for each problem, outline briefly how Ebay’s interaction design has attempted to address this. You can use the following table format: Outline the problem What is the information Design solutions asymmetry? What kind of information is involved? Who has more information Part 3 (15 min) When you go online to search for information about the music you want to buy, the information is often readily available nowadays. You can read the reviews by other buyers or critics, or even seek opinions from friends on social media. You can even get to listen to a short clip of the song on many websites selling music. Going to the doctor is an entirely different experience. Most of us know that we are not feeling well and that we have some symptoms, but most of us don’t have enough knowledge/information to be able to diagnose our health problem. We need the doctor (who has been trained for years and thus has the information) to do that.
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Created by Dr Jim Ang for EL880 HCI for mobiles/week1
There are now several web services, including websites edited by health professionals such as http://www.patient.co.uk/, or http://www.patientslikeme.com/ which is self-‐organised by the patients themselves. Of course, there are many online forums where patients share and exchange personal experience and information. This is a serious business as the cost of getting wrong treatments or diagnosis can be high, and may cost lives in some cases. How can interaction designers make sure that patients get the correct information and help from these websites? One possible way to address the information asymmetry problem is to increase “transparency” and “trust.” Let’s say you are an interaction designer commissioned by the NHS to create a health app with a highly sophisticated algorithm (developed by Oxford University) which can automatically diagnoses a disease based on the information provided by the patient. Please outline at least THREE design features you would include to improve “transparency” and “trust” Design feature How does it make the app more “transparent” and/or “trustworthy”
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