Questionnaire Design and Paper Prototyping
From IEOR 170 Spring 2007
Required Readings
- A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research. Thomas F Burgess, University of Leeds.
- Prototyping for Tiny Fingers Marc Rettig, Communications of the ACM.
Discussions
Please post your critiques/commments on the required readings below. To do that, first login by using your user name and password, then click the "edit" tab on the top part of this page (between the "discussion" page and the "history" page), New to wikis? Read the Wiki editing guide. . Hint - Please put a whole line == ~~~~ == at the beginning of your submitted critique, so the wiki system will index, sign and date your submission automatically.
[edit] Rey Doctora 21:06, 16 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This read was very straightforward and informative. I wish I had read the section on age ranges before having taken a class in which I was required to create a questionnaire to survey individuals within the city of Berkeley. I recall having asked for the individual's age range, not their precise age (which the article promotes) to take advantage of various benefits including statistical analysis. I also liked the reading's advocation of creating surveys that are too-the-point and not lengthy. Like many students at Cal, I have refused to take Career Center surveys or the like merely because they were too wordy and dense. Often times, however, if a survey offers incentive, I am usually drawn in. The article mentions this as a powerful tool to receiving more responses from individuals and I agree.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article was an interesting read especially after our paper-prototyping activity for a modified take-out box last Wednesday in class. I never knew that lo-fi prototyping is such a powerful tool and, as evidenced by this reading, lo-fi prototyping even extends to other industries (the software/computer interface industry in this reading). I thought the points regarding the downfalls of hi-fi prototyping were sound, especially the point about developers resisting change. As engineers, we have experienced numerous programming projects and assignments in our classes and once we have finished coding an assignment, rarely do we ever want to rework the code. This is synonymous to developers resisting product development change. Reworking code is time-consuming, stressful, and a lot of work. Lo-fi prototyping provides a means to evaluate and iteratively test a product so that it is close to perfection before committing to code. This is a powerful advantage and I think it is also very efficient when used in product design.
[edit] Brian Loo 13:21, 17 February 2007 (PST)
“Design of Questionnaire” This article discussed the concepts of making a good and bad survey. This reading is going to make a really good resource when we need to construct our survey for people. They organized the reading in a nice easy to read format that goes chronologically of how to do the survey from start to finish. One major point I thought they should have addressed but didn’t was in the “Questions to be Asked” section. Questions you ask should be written in a manner not to lead them on to a certain response. For example, “Are you going to attend Cal?” versus “Where will you be going to school?” In the first question, we get the person being surveyed thinking about Cal, where in question two, it gives the person being surveyed to think about anything. Furthermore, I was really surprised that most of the time people never think about how they will do that data analysis before conducting the survey. So thinking about how you will use your data from the start and how the data analysis will be done is crucial as otherwise you will have tons of data and nothing more. A good example of this practice is like the Safeway Card, they collect tons of data on people shopping habits, but how do you translate that into data in better for4ecasting and decreasing inventory?
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers” Marc Rettig makes some interesting points about the idea of Lo-Fi or paper prototyping. So far throughout class we only talked and discussed the benefits of Hi-Fi protyping with programs and such like dtools. Further the way we have been introduced to design so far is how the reading started with the idea of storyboard, brainstorm, prototype, and then test. But the idea behind this article is not like that, it more like just start your prototyping during your storyboard so that you can constantly test it with users and make several redesigns in a shorter amount of time. This article discusses the pros of Lo-Fi over Hi-Fi such as you can save time, easier to fix, and gets user feedback on the main issue and not little details. In addition, the reading walks through the process of developing an effective Lo-Fi prototype and how to test it with users. After reading this article, Lo-Fi prototyping has many benefits and advantages to it that can be used.
[edit] Asmita Karandikar 19:47, 17 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article gives a lot of good information that is useful in designing and implementing surveys, ranging from what questions to ask to delivering the survey. I think this article was interesting to read, and I like that it presents examples along the way. I think a really important section is “Determine the Questions to Ask.” It stresses the importance of knowing ahead of time what information you are trying to get out of the survey. Running a pilot survey reminded me of prototyping – it gives you the opportunity to see if the survey you designed is effective, and if there are any unforeseen errors. Overall, I enjoyed reading the article and found it very informative.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article discussed the importance and benefits of low-fidelity (lo-fi) prototyping,. Lo-fi prototyping is useful because it allows you to create many prototypes before committing to a design. On the other hand, hi-fi (hi-fi) prototyping takes to long to build. The article continues to give steps on how to prepare for a user test involving a low-fi prototype, and how to evaluate the results. I gained appreciation for lo-fi prototyping after last Wednesday’s class, where we build prototypes of take out boxes. I appreciated that the article mentions setting deadlines for prototyping, since I was amazed at how much we were able to accomplish in class in such a short amount of time.
[edit] Michael Toulouse 00:35, 18 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This first article takes a very practical stance, explaining in detail how a questionnaire should be made and refined. A lot of the information seems to be easily generalized to just tips in communicating with others in a professional capacity, but they are regardless useful.A good suggestion was to test the questionnaire on a smaller willing group first, to spot problem areas. Overall, the article seemed to speak more from experience than any semblance of theory, and would be very useful for anyone needing to design one.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
The second article focuses on lo-fi prototyping, which involves using basic materials and methods to simulate an interface, allowing quicker iterations of the design phases. The depth of its practicality is to the point where it even suggests what supplies to buy at an office supply store, which is worrying, as too much detail can mean that it doesn't always apply. Even so, the basic cincept is conveyed well and it gives roles and an estimate of how much manpower is needed. Altogether just as practical as the first article.
[edit] Tawan Udtamadilok 01:10, 18 February 2007 (PST)
"A general introduction to the design of questionnaires for survey research."
This article focused on the best ways to create surveys that will provide good feedback. The overall message of the article is that in creating a survey, one must be very careful to phrase and format it properly so that the survey participant is comfortable and gives accurate responses to the questions. For the most part, I felt that this article was a very long how-to that listed several things that you shouldn’t do. Although the advice is very particular, it helped me to think about how different aspects of the survey could affect the participant’s responses. I enjoyed the sample surveys and the external links as well.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
Paper. Lots of paper. Rettig’s article emphasizes that paper is inexpensive and easy to change. He discusses low-fidelity design as an essential tool for prototyping. It allows the designer to iterate more in the beginning stages of the design process, before too much time and too many materials are invested in the product. Rettig recommends testing on a variety of users in this low-fidelity stage. I feel that is his very delicate technique for non-biased testing will be very effective.
[edit] Patrick Liu 11:58, 18 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article discusses the seven basic principles to creating an effective survey. The first step is to fulfill the aims of the research without asking too many questions. The second step is to be able to narrow down the population of people who will be taking the survey. The population should consist of people who are the closest related to the aim of the survey. The third step consists of two types of methods to administer the surveys. Structured interview and Self-administered questionnaires are the two types of surveying methods. The fourth step involves the questionnaire design; this consists of three things: the questions to be asked, selecting the question type and wording for each question, and designing the survey in a questionnaire layout. The layout should be clear and concise and should not have excessive wording that can alter the answers of the surveyor. Out of all the questioning types, I believe the open vs. closed questions are the most effective because they are the least confusing and the quickest to fill out. Confidentiality and ethics are extremely important when it comes to surveying, if the surveyor is not protected by confidentiality then no one would give their honest answers. The fifth step is to run a pilot survey. The sixth step is to carry out the actual survey by identifying respondents and keeping track of the current status, numbering each questionnaire, and delivering the questionnaire. Obviously the final step is analyzing the data. The data if not skewed can provide vital information towards the aim of the project.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article discusses the effectiveness of low-fidelity prototyping. Low-fidelity prototyping allows the designer to create many different prototypes before deciding on one design. In contrast to high-fidelity prototyping which is essentially the antonym to low-fidelity prototyping and this type usually takes longer to build. The article continues on by explaining how low-fidelity prototyping is used and how to utilize the results. Low-fidelity prototyping portrays many useful qualities such as: saving time, ease of altering the project, and allows for user feedback on bigger issues. I am glad we got to experience first hand how useful and effective low-fidelity prototyping was in class on Wednesday. It gives me a greater appreciation and understanding of this article.
[edit] Andrew prasetyo 18:10, 18 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”
This is an interesting article about questionnaires. I myself have designed several questionnaires in order to collect some data. However, I never realized there are several important steps that need to be considered. People often take information from questionnaires for granted. Often times, they do not consider the quality of the questions, so they only ask what they want to know. As a result, in most questionnaires, often I find some repeated questions. The data collection is also another important factor of conducting questionnaire research. I agree with the author that researchers should identify the target (people they want to ask), decide the method of data collection, such as using an interview, mail, or email, and conduct the questionnaires at the right time. Finally, the question and layout designs of the questionnaires are also determining factors. Lengthy questionnaire, small fonts, ambiguous questions, and weird symbols are examples of bad designs that often overlook by questionnaire designers. Thus, a good design is very important because will generate respondents’ interest and provide the researchers with reasonable and reliable data.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article introduces a new way of prototyping, i.e. using papers and scissors. It is very interesting to note that Lo-Fi prototyping can provide so many benefits to both users and researchers. I agree with the author that Lo-Fi provides efficiency in design process because the designers can always refine their design without incurring too much cost or building a physical prototype every time they want to test their design. It is also true that some prototype may take several months to build and can be done a lot faster using Lo-Fi. However, I still believe that Hi-Fi prototyping is still important for some designs. This is because not many designs can be done in paper and scissors. For instance, in order to test the strength and the durability of a product, designers should consider building prototype with the real material so that the users can experience the real product. Some products may generate good response in its paper prototype, but the users may give different response if the product is made of its real materials.
[edit] Richard Chen 00:51, 19 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
The argument presented in this article has led me to conclude that effective and concise surveys are the key to success in collecting invaluable data for use in future designs. By focusing the surveys and customizing their content to a select group of customers, the data generated would be a lot more effective if that wasn’t the case. From my own experience, one of the biggest turn-offs in filling out a potential survey is its level of inappropriateness for my situation. Thus, I would also really advocate for the notion of customizing surveys and zeroing in on a select group of customers. Furthermore, I believe that the wording of the question is extremely important—language is always paramount. Avoiding anything negative or offensive in the wording of the question is a must when trying to get useful information out of the person being surveyed, particularly if that customer group has a certain background or culture. The individuals involved in designing the survey must be extra-sensitive and accommodating of that fact. Finally, I also liked the passage in the article that talked about the differences between surveys and interviews. People will respond differently depending on whether the question is asked in-person or via paper—and being privy to those differences would mean a huge degree of difference in the quality of the data that is ultimately collected.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
What I enjoyed the most about this paper was its emphasis on how the more cycles there are, the more improved the product. I firmly believe that this is a strategy that is a whole lot better than trying to get the product right at the first try. Furthermore, I strongly resonate with this notion that it is always cheaper to go through many iterative cycles via this lo-fi prototyping method, saving lots of time, money, and energy in the process. If each iteration means improvement, then this lo-fi prototyping method is a cost-effective means to fulfill that. Furthermore, I really enjoyed reading over the part where the author talks about how you aren’t going to start getting it right until you put something in front of actual users and start refining your idea based on the customer’s experience with my design. In order to overcome that paralysis with coming up with that initial design,, it is important to always set a deadline and to force oneself to take a preliminary crack at each important aspect of the problem. Thus, initially, it is always better to start off with the 80-20 rule, where you first take 20% of your time to tackle 80% of the total project, which should usually cover the most important, pressing issues. Only afterwards, should you spend the rest of your 80% efforts to tackle the remaining 20% of the project. This strategy is excellent in how it urges the designer to get the big things done right during lo-fi, and the little things will thus follow in later iterations.
[edit] Bryan Boling 12:01, 19 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”
This article provided a very detailed and lengthy description of how to design and analyze a questionnaire. Although there was a great deal of useful examples provided throughout the paper, I thought it was a bit wordy. I found most of the information provided in the article to be common sense, and felt like I’ve been exposed to this type of information many times before. Many parts of this article focused on making your questionnaire concise and attracting the sample group to actually complete the questionnaire, and the author of this article did neither for the potential readers of the article. It most definitely could have been more concise, but if you’ve never seen or heard of a questionnaire, this article has all the information you’ll need to be an expert questionnaire builder.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article provides a good description of lo-fi prototyping, giving information on how to construct paper prototypes, as well as how these prototypes can be used to iterate a design many times in a very short time period. Having constructed a lo-fi prototype of a take out box last week in class, I understand the usefulness of this design step. After spending less than an hour on our design, my group during class last week came up with a fairly innovative take-out box. Although that was the end of our take-out box design, I immediately saw a few ways in which our design could be improved upon just by watching it used once. Also, I’ve build lo-fi prototypes for other courses, and have found them very useful in the design process since they are quick to build, cost almost nothing, and give instant feedback on the design at hand.
[edit] Esha Datta 14:05, 19 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
I thought there were many good suggestions for survey design in this article. I think that it is especially important to make sure that each question has a clearly defined specific focus. I have encountered many poorly designed surveys where there were many superfluous questions which did not address any important research questions and which were on the survey simply for the sake of being there. Concise surveys which get to the point are also more likely to have a higher response rate. I also think that it is really important to do a pilot study. When you are actually writing a survey, it is difficult to step back from the questions and think about whether there are multiple ways in which they can be interpreted.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article showed the many advantages of using lo-fi prototyping. I definitely agree that lo-fi prototyping is essential in getting user feedback early on so that design insights and problems can be identified from the very beginning. I also thought the author had a good point that designers become attached to high fidelity prototypes and are unwilling to make substantial changes to a project they have invested significant time into. While this article talked about paper prototypes for software applications, it is just as important to make rough mockups for physical products as well.
[edit] Onyi Lam 16:45, 19 February 2007 (PST)
“Design of Questionnaire”
This is a useful article that provides us a general guideline to design a questionnaire when we need to gather data for our final project later. Very much similar to the other design processes, designing a questionnaire requires the researchers to have a specific goal they want to achieve and a specific set of questions they want to answer. This article also explores different types of responses and their effects on the results of the questionnaire: single vs. multiple, closed vs. open responses. It is also very important to have concise and unambiguous wordings in the questionnaire. One example that the author used was “Are you against a ban on smoking” and the respondent is instructed to answer “Yes” or “No”. This is very confusing in terms of it usage of double negatives and are better way to ask this question may be “Do you support a ban on smoking”. Another suggestion I found useful in the article was to run a pilot study on some colleagues and friends to test the usability of the survey and spot any mistakes in the questionnaire.
“Prototyping for tiny fingers”
We have read about a few articles about prototyping for the previous lectures about d.tool and it is an advance “hi-fi” prototyping tool. This article is about “lo-fi” prototyping which essentially is building a prototype on a paper. There are a lot of advantages over “hi-fi” prototyping because it takes a lot less time and once developers built a “hi-fi” prototyping tool, they tend to resist changes and it is very hard to implement the changes as well. Even though “lo-fi” does not give a complete picture of the product, the developers can still provide a lot of insights and observers can be easily inspired from the test. I find a ‘lo-fi” testing session very interesting because the researcher will act as the computer and by doing so, familiar him/herself more to the user’s logic. To make “lo-fi” prototyping more effective, the author also suggests that it is best to set a deadline such that there is an obligation to finish certain aspect of the design.
[edit] Siu Pan Lam 22:10, 19 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article basically gives a guideline on how to design a survey for research purposes. I find that the outline depicted in the article is very helpful because it clearly addresses the main points for each step on how to design a survey, such as identifying your aim and choosing an effective sampling frame. One thing that I learned from reading this article is the anticipated survey response rate, which is usually set at 20% as mentioned in the article. This is important because not everyone who takes the survey will return their response, so it is always good to have an idea of how many surveys to prepare and how many surveys are expected to be returned to the experimenter. Sometimes, I receive survey requests in my school email, and many of these surveys are in closed-question format. I think this is a smart idea because many of the people who take surveys want to be able to finish it quickly, and using closed questions that can identify individual judgment can contribute greatly to the research.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article gives a great introduction on lo-fi prototypes and its advantages over hi-fi prototypes. After reading this article, I was able to gain an understanding on what lo-fi prototyping is - "building prototypes on paper and testing them with real users." In the article, the author mentioned about the "fit and finish" issues, which basically means that users typically look at the big picture or the design as a whole, instead of the little details. I agree with the author because with the use of hi-fi prototypes, the designers might spend too much time picking a pretty font, which is unimportant because the key is to reiterate and come up with new ideas, hence making as many prototypes as possible. In fact, we have experience on building lo-fi prototypes during the takeout box exercise last week, except that we spent only about twenty minutes on building the prototypes. Overall, it appears that lo-fi prototypes are more advantageous than hi-fi prototypes in terms of getting good feedback on your design.
[edit] Urvashi 23:42, 19 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article was very informative as I’d never realized there are so many things one should consider while drawing up a survey. Having taken many surveys myself, I notice that it’s the long and tedious ones that are really annoying and this article also supports the use of short and interesting surveys so people don’t lose interest fast and actually make an effort to do the survey. Also the part on the wording of the questions was useful, as often we ourselves are so well versed in the subject we are researching that we take it for granted that the people doing the survey will already be knowing the basic things and don’t make an effort to clarify each question and put it across neatly. I also liked the seven point framework given in the beginning of the article that outlines each step in the survey process and makes it really easy for even a first-timer to carry out a successful survey. Another common pitfall many researchers have to avoid is the temptation of asking too many questions. It seems like we should get all we can out of the survey, since we are conducting one anyway, but that may seem tedious and unnecessary to survey takers especially if the questions sound repetitive and will lower the return rate of successfully completed surveys.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article discusses the advantages of lo-fi prototyping over hi-fi prototyping. Although I may not be an expert on prototyping, his argument is pretty convincing and I am led to believe that paper prototyping and the idea of continually cross checking with users is much better than that of refining a project and then building and testing a prototype only towards the end. His two points of contention are that regular high level prototyping takes up a lot of time only to have to redo the whole thing again in the end due to the omission of an important detail. Paper prototyping however, is much faster and can be re done as many times as necessary until the design is perfected and is ready to be tested by turning it into a high level prototype. Secondly, once a particular prototype has been worked on for long enough, there will be reluctance to abandon it in favor of a more feasible idea by the designers and to prevent this they should work only with rough prototypes until the idea has been sufficiently tried and tested.
[edit] Timothy Manglicmot 10:31, 20 February 2007 (PST)
[edit] A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
This article presents a good framework for composing and conducting questionnaires for survey research. Prior to reading it I had no idea the level of detail required for a fast and efficient survey design. However, a lot of the points in the article made a lot of sense. One point I found especially interesting was the design of the questions. Often times when I’m answering a survey the first thing I look at is the length of the survey: if it looks too long I will never complete it but if it looks short and easy I will always take the time to complete it. Designing the questions and the survey to look shorter and easier to complete is a very good strategy for higher survey response rates. After all, the article did mention, on average, the survey response rate is 20% and at this low rate it will take a lot of surveys to get an apt sample size; utilizing the shorter, more concise strategy of question and survey design can, hopefully, raise the rate and making the surveyor’s job a lot easier. One aspect of the article, though, which I found disagreeable, was the open vs. closed question segment. Closed questions, in my opinion, need to be designed very carefully to avoid tunneling to specific answers; i.e. the survey designer, although he or she may not know it, may implicitly want to see a specific answer and will design the closed question to get his or her preferred answer. Overall, though, I found this article to be very interesting and helpful for future designs.
[edit] Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This article talks about “Lo-fi prototyping,” a low cost, easy-to-do design prototyping method which uses several iteration steps before building “Hi-fi prototypes” which are essentially the opposite. I thought the article was very informative and helpful in terms of designing based on usability and formative evaluation. I’m starting to think, however, that the idea of having the maximum amount of iterations and design steps before committing to an actual, high-cost design is somewhat of a fad in today’s design world. Although I do believe that there should be several, low lost, “Lo-fi prototypes” before eventually building the final design, I don’t think designers should overdo the low-cost prototypes as it is, seemingly, becoming the trend in several of the articles we have read. I think there should enough lo-fi prototypes to work out the small bugs, however once those are figured out than the hi-fi prototypes should be implemented. I do like, though, the idea of using paper prototypes as it is time efficient and easy.
[edit] Michael Chen 10:50, 20 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
Honestly, I felt that this article wasn't too necessary for us to read. The article covers 7 different stages in implementing surveys, but many of these steps are given only a cursory overview. That in itself is not instrinsically bad, but instead focuses attention on the meat of the article, which is designing the survey itself. The thing is, as undergraduate students, we've been bombarded with questionnaires from pretty much every direction possible. Applying to anything nowadays will illicit a survey, and we don't really need to learn from an article that we can use checkboxes or rankings, or that checkbox responses are coded in software differently than ranking responses. The things to keep in mind, such as "Be concise and unambiguous," are just a little to obvious to be considered insightful. One quick, 15 minute exercise in class on this topic would be far more useful than this article.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article was a far better read than the previous one. By cocooning the material in a narrative, there was additional motivation to read the article, and to place the material in context. Both the design of the lo-fi prototype and the description of the actual user-testing and roles of the team members are useful, non-obvious information. By far the most important part of the article was the single picture showing the actual lo-fi prototype, and how it consisted of many different pieces, rather than a storyboard-like series of frames. Another part of the article that I liked is its tone, which addresses the skeptic, assuming that the reader thinks that a lo-fi approach is, well, kind of stupid, and shows them in what areas that it is really useful.
[edit] Erin Palermo 14:29, 20 February 2007 (PST)
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
I enjoyed reading this article. The arguements presented about the dangers of hi-fi prototypes were compelling. It is true that you need to give the user the basic feel of the device, without getting caught up in the minor details like colors or font. Those are post-production factors, not things that hinder the actual useability of the interface. Lo-fi methods are sufficient for this type of testing. I also like the kit assembly. Just like the materials we were given when we assembled our own take-out boxes, the assembly kit is basic, but sufficient. The lo-fi approach is useful for most all initial interfaces. I think it would be fun to "play" the role of the computer, if on a design team.
Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
This was a useful article. Designing surveys is a far more involved process than I had espected. At the beginning, the paper claimed "Your greatest enemy in survey research may well be poor response rate. Clear and concise questionnaires can help get the best response." While this sounds true, this is also dangerous because collecting data is important, and making questionnaires too concise may eliminate useful data that you wanted. The discussion about the format of the survey was also helpful. I didn't know that the font 'Times' was easier to read than 'Helvetica' because Times includes serifs. What the article should have mentioned was that it is easier to read fixed-width fonts, rather than variable-width fonts. In the section about rated responses, I think the survey could have beeen designed with a better map from the acronyms to the implementation. At the top, they list the acronyms (VI= very important, etc.) and then below that list they have the chart, and the chart uses the acronyms. It would be a lot easier to understand if they didn't have an acronym list, and just had the acronyms listed above the table. They are not too long to be overwhelming, and would help make the survey easier to use.
[edit] Monica Tanza 14:56, 20 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
Before reading this article, I had not realized how much planning goes into a questionnaire, including the simple things like formatting to make it appear short and concise. There were many valid points and helpful ideas in this article, despite the fact that the last part about computer programming was over my head. One issue ws the point in not asking for confidential information. This made me think of my grandma because she told me that when she does questionnaires, she refuses to answer her annual income, finding it too personal and intrusive, whereas a majority of people do not mind releasing that information. It just goes to show that what one person might not think is obtrusive, someone else may. I also liked how they recommended a pilot survey to find errors. I remember doing surveys when in junior high for a science fair project and I never thought of doing a pilot survey. I realize now how much easier that makes things in the long run.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This article discussed lo-fi prototyping, which is the idea of using paper models to represent user interfaces. The main advantage to using lo-fi prototypes is that design teams feel less tied down to ideas and are able to go through more iterations of a design in a shorter amount of time, as well as fixing “bugs” instantly during a test. The benefits do seem to out weigh the drawbacks. Throughout the article, I was left wondering if there was an equivalent idea when you are prototyping something other than a user interface for a computer.
[edit] Katherine Tong 21:27, 20 February 2007 (PST)
"A general introduction to the design of questionnaires for survey research"
Burgess does a very clear job of explaining how a questionnaire is developed. Before reading this article, I took the design of a survey for granted. I did not realize how much planning and consideration goes into creating these. The part about only expecting a 20% response rate reminded me of a TV show I used to watch. The manager of a gym would give his staff questionnaires about the gym's facilities and the workers' attitudes. The workers would purposely not answer 2% of the questionnaires because the manager always said that 2% were flawed.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
Before reading this article, I never considered creating paper prototypes for computer programs. I found this very interesting because I would think that simulating a computer-human interaction could not give too accurate responses to the software. To my surprise however, the article says that "people find a lo-fi interface more engaging." (26) I think it would be interesting to be in one of the test groups. Although I think that working with the paper prototypes would be interesting and engaging, I'm not sure how well I would be able to respond to the actual software being created.
[edit] Anar Joshi 22:43, 20 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”: This article looked at the process one should follow in order to create and use a survey that can is effective in obtaining information from user groups. The author discussed two ways for researchers to gather information, by conducting interviews with the sample groups or by distributing self administered questionnaires. While it is less work for researchers to send surveys to people, it is also harder for them to get responses. The author cited various ways to increase response rates, such as, including a letter that introduces the nature of survey, including reply paid envelopes, and/or administering follow up calls. Additionally, when explaining a successful layout and sequence to incorporate in survey design, the author said to start with questions that raise interest for the user. I think these are helpful tools that we can use when conducting survey research. Personally, I rarely complete a survey unless I have some sort of vested interest in its outcome or have been offered other incentives.
“Prototyping for Little Fingers”: I found this article interesting because it directly relates to the process that we went through in class last week. Initially, all groups were weary of their abilities to build a take out box with the given materials, but once we started, a lot of great ideas were produced. The process that we went through is called low-fidelity (lo-fi) prototyping and was described in the article as paper prototyping. The author asserted that while lo-fi prototyping appears to be a trivial exercise, it can increase the quality of the final design since it gives the design team the ability to create and test in the early stages of development. In his experience, the author felt that this process was so valuable, that his team would conduct several iterations of lo-fi prototypes. After testing the lo-fi prototypes, the author’s team would then summarize the problems that users discussed and affix a Post-It directly on the relevant part of the prototype. This is another fairly simple idea, but it causes the design team to be directly aware of the concerns raised by the users when interacting with the prototype.
[edit] Michael Lovejoy 23:23, 20 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”
I thought this article was pretty good. It separated the important parts of survey research into seven basic ideas, and described those ideas succinctly and generally. I liked how I understand more of populations and samples (thank you Shanthikumar), which helped me understand that section a little more. I also appreciated how the article emphasized layout and sequence of questionnaires. These seem like mundane details, but for the people actually filling them out, it is fairly important. Ideas from psychology seemed appropriate with the ideas presented in the article, including open and closed questions and different types of responses available. The sample questions used to demonstrate the variations in wording and layout made the points very clear. Overall, I thought it was a very informative article, and I was quite relieved that it wasn’t 20+ pages of boring text.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This was a difficult article to read… mostly because of the bad quality. It was pretty interesting to read about how low-tech approaches seem to work better than “hi-fi” prototypes. It makes sense to me, because the point of the prototype is to learn how the user would interact with the basic idea of what you’re working with. It also makes you focus on the big ideas the prototype is trying to convey. It is not representative of what the finished product should be, and doesn’t claim to be, unlike hi-fi approaches to prototyping. Since it is much easier to work with paper, lo-fi is cheaper, faster, simpler, and allows for more improvements. While it is tempting to make a nice-looking prototype, it’s the final product that should look good and work well. Although the descriptions of how to actually prepare lo-fi prototypes and test them were somewhat unimportant to me, the ideas behind lo-fi were pretty unique and interesting.
[edit] Raymond Kim 23:36, 20 February 2007 (PST)
"A general introduction to the design of questionnaires for survey research"
An interesting read on how to design successful surveys that will provide meaningful results. Many interesting points were made such as the use of concise questions without ambiguity as they usually force the user to give an incorrect response. A step that is often overlooked is perhaps the filtering of surveyees in order to narrow the target group. In many instances data can be skewed simply because the people being surveyed were not qualified to answer the questions. The biggest problem I believe with surveys however is simply incentive. Most of the time little or no incentive is offered, causing people to avoid surveys altogether. A few solutions to this problem were presented such as including prepaid return envelopes.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article presents the concept of lo-fi prototyping as a means to iterate and test user interfaces before investing heavily into full-scale prototyping. It does seem quite useful in that it saves you quite a bit of money while allowing you to make instantaneous changes easily. This concept however appears to be quite limited to software, where the product is mostly a visual, user interface. Extending the lo-fi principles into other types of prototyping such as an actual, physical object may be very difficult as you can't readily substitute feel and touch for a piece of paper. Overall however, this seems like a great way to do a rough, "back of the envelope" type evaluation of a user-interface prototype.
[edit] Rakesh Vij 02:02, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research: This article explains how to set up a good questionnaire when conducting a survey. It is important to have a good questionnaire design because surveys of any kind are expensive and time-consuming, thus to collect the best data it is important to have a good questionnaire. There are seven basic steps that must be taken in ensuring a good survey is written. The first step is defining your research aims since you should know what you are trying to get out of this whole process before you start. You also need to identify the population and sample, decide how to collect data, and also understand how you are going to analyse it. This is an extremely important step because often people write surveys without even understanding if they will be able to analyse the data that they are getting. After you understand that you can decide how to collect replies, design the questionnaire, run a pilot survey, carry out the main survey and analyse the data. I never knew that so many steps and so much thought went into creating a survey. After reading this paper I truly understand the importance of thinking out a survey before you write it.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers: This article starts out discussing the various types of prototyping that exist. First two scenarios are discussed, one in which designers spend weeks and make a physical interactive prototype, and the other in which everything is played out on paper. This second method is known as "lo-fidelity" or simply paper prototyping. The author comments that this type of prototyping can be killer for organizations who have never tried it because it gives cheap results and developments fast. The first and opposite of lo-fi prototyping is known was hi-fi. The problems with hi-fi are that they take to long to build and change. Sure they will give the look and feel but they take to long to change and iterate bringing back results slowly. The author gives an example of where they used lo-fi prototyping to make an automated fast-food ordering system and got lots of positive data within 6 hours. The steps to making a lo-fi prototype are: assemble a kit, set a deadline, and construct models not illustrations. Finally the testing phase needs to happen. For these steps first select users, prepare scenarios, practice, and finally conduct the test. The biggest takeaway that the author says is that regardless of what kind of prototype it is, make sure you are able to get tangible and useful results that can be evaluated. I am really excited about trying lo-fi prototyping especially with my group project.
[edit] Ricky Surachman 09:30, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This is a straightfoward article which explained what you should/can do when you make a questionare and also what you shouldn't do. One interesting idea that I got from this article is about making a prototype questionare before releasing the real one. From my experience, sometimes we tend to be wordy or make an ambiguous question which make people confuse. So, this technique is a good idea because using it, we can minimize the confusion when we are collecting the data.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
In this article, Marc Rettig encouraged designer to use prototype before creating the product. As he explained in the article, using a prototype and do some sampling before designing anything can make the designer capture what the market need and make some adjustment if it is necessary. In this article, Rettig also explained about the advatage of Lo-fi prototype. Lo-fi prototype is a paper prototype. It is easy to be made and easy to be changed compared to hi-fi prototype. So, to get many data before creating compicated product, lo-fi prototype is the best way to start.
[edit] Ryan Jue 09:47, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
This article was a step by step guide or how to create surveys and questionaries. It started with the development stages and went through how to analyze the data. One of the more interesting points in the article was about not requiring a certain number of answers for a multiple selection question. The article wasn't quite clear on the problems and fallacies of using this question method. I'm not quite sure why the article didn't like this method. I would think if you're trying to find products that people most frequently use, you'd want to set a higher amount of selections than 1, but you'd want to regulate the amount of answers so you'd limit it to three choices. In this case, I don't see how why the article would warn us never to use this method.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This article was about paper prototyping. This prototyping method is very beneficial because it saves on time and other resources. It allows the design team to experiment with users interacting with the interface without actually building it. I can see this method being very useful when designing. As an EECS major, we have to design a number of projects and generally we jump right into the coding part. I think that a little prototyping (maybe not to have people test it, but to at least see some of the design and functionality on a piece of paper) will greatly help facilitate the coding process. In addition, for website design layouts, this prototyping method is much faster to see a scaled version of each to compared to coding a sample of each. However, I feel that due to the color schemes, it might be more appropriate to make a photoshop image prototype for websites.
[edit] Connie Ko 11:01, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
I like the topic of the article, mainly because everyone at some point in their lives have created a questionnaire, whether for class or research or work. I think that the material in the article is clearly described in steps. I liked the advice given in the design phase of the questionnaire because it goes into detail about different types of designs that would elicit different types of responses (one check, multiple checks, free response). I agree with what it said about the length of a survey, if it looks long, people will not want to respond to it. One thing I never thought to do was to put a revision or date of the version on the survey. I also found useful the advice on the number of surveys to be sent out in order to reach a target response. Overall, this paper gives a lot of good advice on what and what not to do when designing a survey so that it is easy for the subject to respond and will result in USEFUL information for the researcher and teaches you how to analyze it well.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
I liked this article because it explained a very simple, low tech, and most importantly, effective way of prototyping. Lo-Fi prototyping allows designers to develop prototypes out of cheap materials like paper rather than expensive working prototypes. The advantage to this prototyping method is that the designer can iteratively work out problems in the design a lot faster than with the other method. Also, it encourages people to make more innovative changes because the effort put into developing the prototype is much less than with a working design. This method sort of reminds me of a project management method which is known as the Unified Process. With this method, a lot of different departments are brought into the project earlier on and the project is iteratively tested so that as the project progresses, there have already been many kinks worked out of the project.
[edit] Christopher Ling 11:23, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design Questionnaires for Survey Research:
This article provided a comprehensive outline to making effective surveys. I feel that most of the survey advice is for informational purposes and would come in handy whenever I needed to construct an effective survey. The author stresses the importance of spending enough time formulating and creating your questions. Without adequate time, the survey will not produce useful results and will simply waste time. Even such details as the font type can make a difference because the survey can then be easily read.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers:
This article discussed the concept of Lo-fi prototyping, which allows the user to demonstrate the initial behavior of a product design interface in front of real users to gain constructive feedback. From the many points that suggested the dominance of lo-fi over the hi-fi prototype, it almost seems obvious that you would want to make the most design changes in the shortest amount of time possible. Hi-fi designs can sometimes take weeks or months to prepare, and by that time, it might be too difficult to implement difficult, but necessary changes. I really liked the statement of Fudd’s First law of creativity: “To get a good idea, get lots of ideas.” This law ties back with many of the concepts we have already discusses in class, such as with the constructive brainstorming to generate many ideas.
[edit] James ChunJye Tong 11:38, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article talks about the methods of conducting survey. It starts from aiming the research target, getting the sample, design the questions, to analysis the data. I think this article shows the reader what a good survey is. I think one of the most important things in the survey is designing the question. It is important to use the most correct wording so it would not mislead the person who is doing the survey. Also, I think the format of the survey is very important too. Just like the US President Election article we read before, the butterfly ballot confuses the voter, and therefore, they voted for the wrong person. I think this article is easy to understand and clearly demonstrate what a good survey is.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article discussed how low-fidelity prototyping would benefit the designer during the interface design process. In contrast with hi-fi prototyping, the amount of time putting in during the lo-fi prototyping is much less. The programmers do not have to constantly change their codes until the design is close to finished. I think sometimes it is very frustrating to change things on the computer, especially when you have to constantly make big adjustments. Sometimes doing things by hands can be more efficient than working on the computers.
[edit] Nicolas Suryono 11:59, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This articles talks about the building blocks of surveys. I have designed and completed several surveys myself but never thought that there is a design process involved behind it. When I am completing a survey, sometimes I feel that the question is redundant or not relevant to the topics that the researcher ask. Therefore, I feel that design is an essential part in the survey. We need to ask the right question for the right audience at the right time during a survey.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This articles talks about the benefit of lo-fi prototyping. The lo-fi prototyping has several advantages compared to the hi-fi prototyping. First, it is efficient and can be done by cheap materials. Also, the user do not have to make adjustment to the real device. They can start making changes on their model rather than doing it physically to the device that they are building which will take considerable amount of time for debugging. I also want to mention that hi-fi prototyping is also necessary since we cannot test material durability and toughness by lo-fi design.
[edit] Hong How Quek 11:59, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
This article provides a comprehensive and straightforward description on how to design questionnaires for your research purposes. Although I have conducted many surveys for school projects previously, I have never encountered a guide on designing surveys, nor was I ever taught about survey design in my classes. Hence I found the article really informative, as it not only encapsulates what I already know from experience, it also offered new, interesting nuggets of info such as how survey response rates are usually 20%, and the importance of numbering questionnaires for easier tracking. This article is truly a handy resource guide that I'm sure teams will find useful when we get down to designing questionnaires that probe deeper into user needs.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This article bucks the trend by extoling the benefits of low fidelity prototyping, while citing the dangers of relying too much on high fidelity prototyping. I feel the main problem with high fidelity prototyping is its lengthy process time that shave off valuable weeks of design time that can otherwise be used for a few more iterations that may be crucially in spotting problems that may make or break a design. In addition, designers using high fi prototyping may concern themselves excessively with design aesthetics and be less focussed on functionality. Sticking to low fi prototyping avoids all these complications, reduces cost and most importantly, maximizes the time to allow for several iterations. I think low fi prototyping is the most relevant for our team, since we have little time in the semester to master using high fi prototyping tools (that require a lot more expertise), and I feel that amateur designers should start with using basic methods before advancing to more technologically intensive methods, so that we keep our focus well on maximizing functionality before everything.
[edit] Christine Shih 12:17, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A general introduction to the design of questionnaires for survey research"
i thought this article was VERY interesting because it deals with the proper techniques in creating a good survey/questionnare-detailing a 7 step plan. It mentions how data analysis is dependent on the data which is turn dependent on the questionnare. It is important to ask the right questions. I discovered this when i was trying to get people's opinions on the take-out box. i started out asking really general questions which didn't get me helpful responses like "how do you feel about this take out box?"which the person would usually say "it's ok". i realized i had to be a bit more specific and guide the person to talk about certain topics like: transporting, size, desposing, leakage..etc, but ask those questions generally- like instead of saying "do you feel this takeout box is too big?" i should say "how do you feel about the size of this takeout box?"Another thing i thought was really interesting was how they emphasized that it is important to keep surveys concise and clear. "Respondents are more likely to answer a questionnare when they see it as interesting, of value, SHORT, clearly thought through, and well presented. However,even though respondents might start to fill in the questionnare they may give up if they find it hard work to complete..." This made me think of an incident where i was asked to do this REALLY LONG AND HARD questionnare which basically asked me a lot of us history and political questions. It was like a test. I worked at it for 45 minutes and I just gave up cuz i had to go to class. It was just too long. I think if i were to seriously do it, it would have taken me like 2-3 hours. Plus, they didn't offer me any incentive for all that effort.Later, i read in the Daily Cal the results of that survey and i was disgruntled. It basically said that seniors had less knowledge than freshman/lower classmen on basic us history/politics since we aren't taught that stuff anymore after high school. i didn't feel it was a fair/accurate survey since i really doubt that 1) many people were patient enough to do the survey and 2) that they seriously tried to answer the questions. I tried for like the first 10 pages and then i got really frustrated and started guessing randomly to try to finish it. This article also made me think of another incident where i was asked to do this survey on being asian american, but this time, i was allowed to take the survey home and was given a $5 incentive. Guess what? I completed the survey in about 1 hr and enjoyed the experience.
"Prototyping for tiny fingers"
i completely agree with using "lo-fi" prototyping first to get lots of ideas and to test user response. it is just cheaper and more full-proof method of coming up with a design that users like since you can improve/change it over and over again with not too much effort. "hi-fi" prototyping is cool and techy but it just takes too much time and skill. you are basically creating the real product.you shouldn't do it until you are certain of the design and that you aren't going to make any major changes. our group plans on using the paperprototype for our group project.
[edit] Minhaaj Khan 13:52, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
This article was pretty interesting and had a lot of useful information on how go about designing questionnaires for survey research, a useful tool that can be utilized in the design process. Like some other people have already said, I agree about creating surveys that are straight forward and not lengthy. When I get surveys in Calmail, I click on them to see how long they are and if it looks like it’ll take me way too much time, I won’t fill it out. I liked the idea of offering incentives for taking a survey, but this won’t always be viable, as people value their time and incentives might be too expensive with a limited budget. Another important point in the article was data analysis and thinking about what purpose you’re data will serve once it has been collected. It is important to think about what kind of data you want and what use you’ll put it into once it has been collected, primarily when designing a survey as this will help in keeping the survey short while collecting data that we want and leaving out data we don’t need.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This reading described the process of creating an effective low-fidelity (lo-fi) prototype and talked about how to test the prototype with users. It also talked about the advantages lo-fi prototyping brings over high-fidelity (hi-fi) and the flexibility it gives to designers. It stressed the use of paper and how it can be used in lo-fi prototyping similar to what we did in class. I like the timing of this reading as we are able to understand the point of this reading a lot better as our group exercise in class last Wednesday puts the reading into perspective.
[edit] Megan Whittey 14:22, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
I enjoyed reading this article. It wasn't too long, was easily understood, and got straight to the point. I like the layout in which it was presented. It listed what it was goig to talk about and then numbered out each thing they were talking about. Each new number started with a different page, which to me made it look like less reading than 20 pages, which made me more inclined to read it. It is kind of like when they talked about creating the questionare or survery, how you need to space things correctly and not put too much on the page so you still entice people to complete it instead of being intimidated by it. I found it interesting that they said try and be consistent in your wording and the type of questions you ask on a survey. I didn't know asking different types of questions would make people less likely to take it or more confused. I also liked how it gave so many examples throughout the article about what it was talking about. It made it easier to understand when you saw a picture of what they were talking about. This article provided a lot of useful information that may come in handy one day when analyzing data and creating questionares.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
I also enjoyed reading this article. I liked how much it applied to our class because we have already done this exercise last Wednesday when we built the take out boxes. Some of the things in this article suprised me, but in a good way. I was suprised to see that practicing or running through a test before actually giving it helps improve the quality of it. It makes sense but I wouldn't have thought to do it, especially 3 or 4 times. I also liked the idea of the observers writing down problems or concerns they saw on little note cards. Right away after I read that I thought about how much easier it would be to organize the problems when you are talking about the prototype. You could stick or post the note cards right by the problem on the prototype or organize the cards into different categories. I liked how they said to prioritize your problems too. The other thing that suprised me was how they said they videotaped tests over the user's shoulder or head. This way, user's faces weren't shown, just their interaction with the prototype. It makes sense that this would help out with the privacy issue and help cut down on user's nervousness or embarrassment, but again the thought never occured to me before. This article convinced me that 'lo-fi' prototyping is better than 'hi-fi' prototyping.
[edit] Ryan Panchadsaram 15:47, 21 February 2007 (PST)
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This article starts of nicely with a comparison between lo-fi and hi-fi. This author experienced first hand the benefits of using paper prototypes in a commercial project and wants to share them. He says that that even though hi-fi prototypes are "prototypes", they take too long to build. Four weeks compared to four hours is a lot of time in the design cycle. Lo-fi prototypes can convey the metaphor of what the program is expected to do. Most reviewers are good at commenting on the look and finish of designs but they forget to actually critique the usability of it. Ultimately it maximizes the number of times you can refine your design before you commit. The rest of the article discusses how to test your design and iterate.
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
Survey research is a tough subject which is covered by many books. I have read a longer one in my IS214 class, but this one hits the main points succinctly. It discusses the order that one should take before pursuing a questionnaire or survey. One of the biggest points the author mentions is that even though it is easy to conduct a survey, it is hard to get a response that is meaningful to your study. The author goes into detail on how to better you response rate in question creation techniques.
[edit] Rabia Siddiqi 15:53, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This was a very clear and concise article that described the process of designing questionaires in order to conduct research for design projects. The author divided up the process into seven parts: defining research aims, identifying the population and sample, deciding how to collect replies, designing questionnaire, running a pilot survey, carrying out the main survey and analyzing the data. I liked the idea of first determining issues that need to be resolved in order to analyze the data, and then using those to formulate questions. This way the designer can have a better understanding of why certain people answered a question a certain way and why others gave a completely different answer. I think it was interesting how the author discussed the importance of proper formatting. I never considered it before, but I'm sure that the length, clarity and presentation of the questionaire can have an impact on how the subject answers it. I also enjoyed looking through the appendicies which had interesting sample questionaires.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
This article was also very enjoyable and well-written. For designs such as web interfaces, it is very useful to design a lo-fi paper prototype instead of investing too much energy into a hi-fi prototype. Hi-fi software prototype are often hard to make, take a long time, may cause research subject to focus "fit and finish" issues rather than the actual design, and can set expectations that are hard to change. It is better to identify design and clarity problems early on with a lo-fi prototype rather than having to reconfigure a hi-fi one. I found the steps to building a lo-fi prototype to be very easy to understand and simple to perform. As the article repeatedly claims, while building these prototypes, the designers can be "just like kindergarteners" and use basic model materials to find inspiration. The way the article describes conducting a test of these prototypes was also very interesting. I liked the idea of greeter, facilitator, computer & observer roles for the testers. Having video cameras on can also be useful to go back and analyze different aspects of the interaction with the subject.
[edit] YeeWan Cheung 15:58, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“Prototyping for tiny fingers”
This article introduces two types of prototypes: lo-fi and hi-fi. It points out the idea of paper prototypes (lo-fi) has been around for a long time. It is an easy technique to learn, it’s fast, and therefore allows the designers to try more ideas on users. On the other hand, hi-fi takes a long time to build and modify. The usage of hi-fi will lead the designers to spend 95% or their time to play around with the mechanism of the tool, and left only 5% of time to think about the design. I think this is the biggest problem with hi-fi. It might implicitly encourage the designers to resist for design changes, and also a sing bug in the hi-fi prototype can bring failure to a test. The author walks us through the process of building a lo-fi prototype, and I like the way he gives the readers all the guideline we needed to use a lo-fi prototype. I especially have strong feeling about the second step: Set a deadline because there are times when I was trapped by the pursuing of perfection. There is no such thing call perfection, but there is some call close to perfect. Therefore, it is essential to set a timeline and keeps the design process flows.
“Design of Questionnaire”
This article is a great guide for the design process of a questionnaire survey. It emphasizes the quality of the survey design is directly related to the usefulness of the results obtained from it. Some of the steps are pretty familiar to what I have already known. In the past, I have helped carrying out student survey on campus; however, I have never designed a questionnaire before. I learned it’s better to use close-ended questions, instead of open-ended questions. I understood it is very important that we have covered all the choices possible; however, I also found the challenge within this step.
[edit] Marshall Anderson 16:00, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“Prototyping for Little Fingers”
I enjoyed this article because lo-fi prototyping seems like it is very useful for UI design. It is interesting that the Experience Prototyping article also had a lo-fi approach. In general I agree with the author that lo-fi prototypes can reveal a limited amount of information but that this information is very important. I think that the idea of lo-fi prototyping can be extended past UI design...like doing back-of-the-envelope calculations for things like fluids, stress, heat-transfer. These calculations do not reveal all the details but they are quick to show you the basics of what you are dealing with. I did not like how the article was only about computer UI's.
“Guide to the Design of Questionnaires”
I did not enjoy reading this article. I wondered why we are reading about questionnaires when we just read from task analysis and contextual inquiry that they are to be avoided. I guess there could be times when it would be useful...maybe you need lots of different user responses rather than one or two heavily detailed experiences? Also I thought the author would go into more detail about the user's thoughts but he seemed to focus instead on how to program the computer to do the analysis.
[edit] Jason Hu 16:03, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“Prototyping for Little Fingers”
This reading extolled the virtues of lo-fi prototyping over hi-fi. For instance, lo-fi prototypes are easier, cheaper, and faster to make. Hi-fi prototypes take relatively long to build and to change such that by the time it is time for it to be reviewed, the designers are already too invested in their current design. Testers tend to only comment about superficial aspects of hi-fi prototypes. Minor bugs can ruin a hi-fi prototype test. Basically, hi-fi prototypes set you (are your testers) in your ways at exactly the time when it is most important to have an open mind. This reading further provided fairly comprehensive and practical advice on how to build and these lo-fi prototypes. That was really the most useful part of it all.
[edit] ChuiShan Wong 16:06, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research” After reading “A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research,” I learnt that there are several things that we have to pay attention to before we conduct a survey. Before we create questions of the survey, we have to be very clear in mind that what specific information we are looking for and who are our target group. After answering those questions, a good quality survey can be conducted. This article recalls my experience of conducting a survery when I was in high school. The major problem was the difficutlies to draw accurate response from people. after reading this article, I learnt that those questions in my survey were not good at all.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers” After reading “Prototyping for Tiny Fingers,” I learnt some significant advantages of lo-fi prototyping. Lo-fi prototyping allows designers to get user feedback during the early stage of design and hence many possbile design insights and problems can be identified before commiting a lot of time and effort on a deficient project.
[edit] Shilpi Verma 16:11, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”
I actually really liked this article because it gave a lot of good information on designing and implementing surveys. I like how the author outlined the basic steps for survey research and gave examples of what makes a good and bad survey. A lot of thought has to go into the actual designing of the survey, especially the questions. Many times I have been given surveys where I am just not interested or motivated to give legitimate responses because of the poor design of the survey. Also when surveys are too long, I definitely am disinterested in completing it. The article provides readers with recommendations on how to improve the design of their surveys, for instance by creating a pilot survey to first find errors. Overall, I feel this article was really useful because at some point everyone usually needs to create a survey, and this article educates readers on what factors can improve the design of the survey.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
I found this article a very enjoyable read considering the prototyping activity we had in class last week. The concepts discussed in regards to lo-fi prototyping directly correlated to the process that we went through when trying to design our prototype of the take-out box. I had no idea that lo-fi prototyping is so important and can be so useful. Before reading the article I would have thought that there was potentially more benefit from hi-fi prototyping, but after reading about some of the problems from hi-fi prototyping it makes sense that lo-fi prototyping is more beneficial to entire design process. Lo-fi design allows a design team to go through more iterations of the design in a shorter time span. This is a huge advantage because it is natural that many changes will have to be made to the prototype throughout the entire design process. Overall, the ideas and concepts behind lo-fi prototyping were unique and interesting.
[edit] Luciana Cook 16:14, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article is very useful. I like the example questioners and I also like the way it explains how to create the right type of questions in order to not suggest a bias answers. I think that the types of techniques this artivcle teaches is very useful.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article talks about lo-fi prototyping and creating simulations. This is practical but limits you to a certain extent. It goes as in depth as you make it but it does not create surprises that humans might create.
[edit] Shwan Kazzaz 16:15, 21 February 2007 (PST)
The Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research:
This is a valuable article as questionnaires are not always effective. I like the focusing topics: 1. define the research aims, 2. identify the population and sample, 3. decide how to collect replies 4. design your questionnaire, 5. run a pilot survey, 6. carry out the main survey, 7. analyze the data. It seems like these cover the bases of a thorough survey, which properly gleans the information necessary. I think that it is usually better to use open questions for a survey, but sometimes people get stuck, which is why I like that the article recommends closed questions as well, as they help further the survey. This is really a good step by step method that details how to create a survey. When you think about all of these things in making a survey, you are bound to cover your bases. It is important to always keep the user interested, and this is why you have to combine open ended and closed questions in a survey to engage the user and constantly switch between survey types.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers:
Everyone knows prototyping is important and most designers prototype. However, this article goes a step further to explain that just prototyping is not enough. One must go on to prototype at the right "fidelity." This means that it is a waste of time to spend a lot of time creating a prototype. As it will need to go through many design iterations. Lo-fi prototypes are better, such as "paper prototyping," where one can easily create a prototype over and over again. The article outlines the methods of paper prototyping and illustrates effective methods.
[edit] HAK-SEUNG KIM 16:17, 21 February 2007 (PST)
A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research
The author of this article demonstrates broad information of the design of questionnaires for survey research. First step we need to do is define our research aim, and then identify the population and sample. Then, decide how to collect replies and questionnaire design. Finally, run a pilot survey and analyse the data. The author explains those steps in a very easy way, and I like his article. This article gives me useful information how we actually survey our prototype before making a product.
Prototyping for Tiny Fingers
In this article, the author explains the usefulness of the low-fidelity prototype. This gives the designer many benefits before committing an actual design. This low-fidelity prototyping allows the designer creating many inexpensive and disposable prototypes. I like the way how the author approach to understand the reader with using many example. Also, this reminds me the actual experience of low-fidelity prototype in the class
[edit] Aubuchon 16:17, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“Guide to the Design of Questionnaires”
This article outlines seven major steps towards conducting surveys. I think the authors organized and partitioned the steps very well. One step I would not have thought to be entirely intuitive would be running a pilot questionnaire. Sometimes people automatically feel their planning has created a sound product, but it is a good idea to test it anyway. The author also brings up an interesting point that though these steps are sequential, one must give sufficient thought to future steps, in order to better know how to perform a current step. For example, a researcher must know what analysis he/she would like to do before he/she can determine what type of data is necessary.
“Prototyping For Tiny Fingers”
I enjoyed this article. It was a very smooth read. It was also very relevant after our prototyping exercise last week. The idea is that using “lo-fi” prototyping allows designers to see the most relevant concerns for usability and formative evaluation, because it allows for the most iteration in design. For instance, when we made take-out boxes, none of those designs were ready to be created into a final product, but so many usability issues were illustrated in 20 minutes of lo-fi design. I did not consider the idea of a window in a box, or labels on the outside, or horizontal partitions in a box (as opposed to the usual vertical partitions). In this way, so much can be learned in the initial stages, at a low cost.
[edit] Patricia Wang 16:21, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"Guide to the Design of Questionnaires"
This article overviews the method of surveying, noting that following proper form for questionnaires will allow for better data analysis. Overall, this was an interesting and digestible read which offered a number of interesting points. For example, it mentions that a common downfall of questionnaires is simply asking too many questions. Though the researcher may be eager to uncover answers, the appearance of a questionnaire can most definitely be described as intimidating and therefore more likely to have poor response rate. It was also recommended that the questionnaire start of with questions that may spark the interest of the respondent, drawing them in to at least start the survey. Generally speaking, it seems like avoiding convolution and really just keeping everything as simple as possible will make a better means of collecting data.
“Prototyping For Tiny Fingers”
This article starts by describing “lo-fi prototyping” primarily as used in the design of software. Rather than discussing and settling on design points and moving straight to coding, the development team constructs paper prototypes and sends out members of the development team to test it out on actual users. “Hi-fi prototypes,” on the other hand, are described to have a slew of problems that interfere with the design process. For example, because of the inherent complexity of these prototypes, they are more prone to glitches and are substantially harder to modify. I thought it was interesting that the design team would not be able to efficiently retrieve high-level feedback with hi-fi prototypes since test users would be more inclined to focus on the “fit and finish” details of the model. The article then walks through a general guideline of how to prepare and execute a lo-fi prototype.
[edit] Justin Hsu 16:22, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
The article "A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research" was an enjoyable read. I liked how the article showed us an extremely clear-cut framework of 7 steps for creating effective surveys. What I found particularly worth noting was how the article put particular emphasis on the layout/sequence/order of questionnaires. At first glance, these qualities may not seem too important but I have found that it may actually be the most significant aspect of a survey. For instance, I personally never bother to fill out any type of survey. When I am considering whether or not to participate in a survey, I look for the layout to be as inviting, succinct, and clear as possible. Many surveys I have had experience with do not do enough to address at least one of these points. The examples the article used to illustrate good and bad examples were very effective in illustrating how layout affects the overall appeal of the survey. There was very little I disliked about the article, but there were several instances where I felt the article was redundant. There were times where it seemed like they had utilized dozens of different synonyms for “concise.” However this criticism is somewhat hypocritical because I do the same thing.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article “Prototyping for Tiny Fingers” was easy to read and follow because its point was very intuitive: lo-fi prototypes are superior to hi-fi prototypes in many respects. The lo-fi prototype is beneficial in many ways because it is cheap and easy to make, it gives potential users the opportunity to experience how they would use it on a very basic level, the simplicity of a lo-fi prototype keeps the design team focused on the main issues at hand, and it is not difficult to change and modify in an iterative process. There are countless other reasons that I have not listed here as well. I believe that a hi-fi prototype should not even be considered until a large number of lo-fi prototypes have already been made and the product is on the verge of finalization. This is a theme that has been prevalent in many of our previous readings, something I appreciate. I especially liked the figure where it showed a lo-hi prototype scattered in pieces because it was even more lo-hi than I thought it would be, reemphasizing the fact that simpler is indeed better. I also thought it did a good job of making a particular effort to address conflicting viewpoints.
[edit] Joshua Funamura 16:23, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"Design of Questionnaires"
The main advice that the author gave for designing questionnaires was to be clear and concise, though it is easy to be confusing, misleading, and biasing. Like the design process for everything we've learned, again, an iterative process is encouraged, with user testing to be completed in between iterations to provide feedback. I would have liked to see more about how shape design might affect the response type - for instance on computer-based surveys, round radio buttons would indicate a single response, while squares tend to indicate the use of check boxes that would have one or multiple responses. Though it's put in example many times, I would also like to see more about the best ways to design the questionnaires as to make analysis and data recording simpler without confounding the respondant. I remember answering one form where the 'yes' and 'no' were switched, though the columns were lined up. They did it because they wanted to be able to quickly scan to see if anything was alarming (something in the right-most column), but it was really confusing to fill out.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
I liked the idea of creating a lo-fi toolkit for doing prototypes - it seems that by constraining your presentation to just those items, you can ensure that ideas can be implemented quickly. The idea of photocopying blank windows also seems really useful for creating these simple but "accurate" and flexible models. It seemed the big selling point for the lo-fi models, besides helping to iterate through a design faster, was to lower expectations from both management and testers, and force them to see the content and real progress rather than be nit-picky about the details of the implementation. As we saw with the take-out box design activity, making paper prototypes can help flesh out ideas so that they can be easily presented and tested, but don't require very much cost, whether it be time or materials.
[edit] Umber Masood 16:26, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”
This reading was very useful and gave a good outline of how to write a questionnaire. I was amazed that the average survey response rate is 20%. To encourage responses, some questionnaires tell respondents they will be entered into a drawing for a prize if they complete the survey. I thought the part about coding the responses into a computer was interesting. The reading mentions Likert scales; I think it is very important that there be an odd number of choices the respondent can choose from. In that way, there is a number that corresponds to when the survey taker feels neutral about a particular statement. I have seen some questionnaires where there is an even number of choices to choose from, and it can be very difficult to pick a response when feeling neutral about the topic. I agree with the reading that it is better for the questions to not have negatives. Such questions may require more thinking and can confuse the test taker. I also think that electronic questionnaires, such as those completed on websites, have an indicator for the respondent which shows how much of the survey remains. Surveys done through websites do not have the convenience of those done on paper (survey takers can not flip though the survey to gauge its length), and questionnaire takers may get impatient if they do not know how long the survey is (which may also lessen the response rate). If a survey taker does not know how long a survey is, he or she may not take it. The reading makes a good point about having survey takers enter their age versus having them select an age group: by entering the age, it is easier for the administrators of the test to calculate mean and standard deviation, as well as to group the respondents by age. Furthermore, the reading talks about running a pilot survey, which is consistent with the idea of the iteration stage of the design process talked about in previous readings, though it seems as if there would be only one iterative step in making a questionnaire. Overall I found this reading to be very useful and interesting.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This was another interesting article. I didn’t know that in such a high tech field as software design they used such a low tech technique of paper prototyping. I liked how the article outlined the various reasons that hi-fi prototypes did not work. I agree with Rettig that users in the testing phase should not be people that are known; it is definitely possible that users who are family, friends, or coworkers will alter how they act and what they say to gain the designer’s approval. This article reminded me of the in-class takeout box exercise that was done in groups. I learned a lot from that exercise, and we were able to build a functioning prototype within one class period. What I learned in this article will be very useful for the group project. Our group can first make a prototype with paper and work out any design flaws that occur, slowly working our way to a hi-fi prototype. Overall, this article was very useful. It talked about a practical and efficient way of making prototypes. This article directly related to what we are learning in class.
[edit] Royapakzad 16:38, 21 February 2007 (PST)
“A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research”
The article provides the guidelines for designing an extensive and well prepared questionnaire for data analysis and survey researches. I personally had the experience of preparing questionnaire as one of my high-school projects. Almost all the guidelines provided in this article were the key steps that me and my group members made sure to follow. It is essential to make sure the questions are as concise as possible and the subject matter of the questionnaire is not abstract. Choosing the right sample for your survey is a huge step towards a more accurate and more reliable survey. Moreover, making the topic of the questionnaire interesting and explain to your target population that how completing the survey will help the authorities to improve living in their community (or something of that nature.)
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
Low fidelity prototyping: I also agree that lo-fi prototyping is time efficient and more convenient for any group of inventors or engineers that are trying to test their new product. The in-class activity on last Wednesday was a good example of lo-fi prototyping. By using cardboard paper, a pair of scissors, tape, and wrapping foil, each group was able to build a simple demo of their product which was a take-out-box and they also demonstrated the features and unique characteristics of their model to the audience. Especially when it comes to iteration process, rebuilding a hi-fi prototype will be way more complicated compared to rebuilding a lo-fi prototype.
[edit] Yang Hung 16:44, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This reading was very straightforward and informative too. This article will be very valuable when we create our own surveys for this class. I really liked the section questionnaire design since it answers one of the questions that I've always had about surveys: how should you design your questions so that the data that you collect is accurate. The appendices that have examples of sample questionnaire forms were also helpful in framing the article topics. One criticism that I have about the sample forms is that they also use the traditional 1-5 rating system, which I think might bias some people when they enter their responses.
"Prototyping for Tiny Fingers"
This article talks about the concept of Lo-Fi prototyping, which is a technique to develop cheap the quick prototypes and gain more user feedback. This article reiterates the theme of iterative improvement, which has been mentioned many times throughout this course. However, I still remain skeptical about the benefits of lo-fi prototyping because I see the value that a hi-fi prototype can bring. A hi-fi prototype is closer to the final product than a lo-fi prototype. Thus, with a lo-fi prototype, you gain in flexibility but the feedback that you receive might not be as good as what you'd get from a hi-fi prototype.
[edit] Sumeet Patel 16:47, 21 February 2007 (PST)
"A General Introduction to the Design of Questionnaires for Survey Research"
This article talked about how to create surveys that will give you the best feedback with minimal amount of bias. The main point of the article talked about phrasing questions so to make the person feel comfortable. Also another point it made was to phrase questions in a general manner in not to bias the response to one way or the other. A point which I thought was interesting was to create smaller questions which would encourage people to respond to more questions. The key is to break up big questions into a series of small questions without biasing the questions.
“Prototyping for Tiny Fingers”
This article discusses the differences between lo-fi prototyping which i