Introduction to Volume 18, Issue 4

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Our August 2023 essay is from Wonil Hwang on “Online User Reviews: A Treasure Trove of UX Research?” The essay describes potential benefits when using online user reviews as source material for UX research along with potential biases.

In addition to the essay, this issue includes two research papers. One is on the design of software toggle switches, and the other is on different ways to interpret time on task.

The first article is “Designing User Interface Toggles for Usability,” by Alyaa Al-Jasim and Pietro Murano. The authors tested multiple toggle designs and used the results to craft toggle design guidelines.

The second article is “Efficiently Engaging: Toward an Expansive View of Time on Task,” by Lawrence Williams. For task-based research, longer task completion times are usually interpreted as indicating a poorer experience than shorter times. When users have priorities other than task efficiency, however, there can be contexts in which longer task times indicate a better user experience. Understanding the context is key when interpreting this metric.

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The Authors

  • James R. (Jim) Lewis, Ph.D

    Dr. Lewis is a Distinguished User Experience Researcher at MeasuringU. He has published influential papers on the assessment of perceived usability and sample size estimation for usability studies and has product experience in the design and evaluation of user interfaces (graphical, spoken, mobile), including having been the lead interaction designer for the product widely regarded as the first smart phone, the Simon. He is on over 90 US patents and has over 100 publications. His five books include Practical Speech User Interface Design and, with Jeff Sauro, Quantifying the User Experience and Surveying the User Experience. In 2021 he was inducted into the Academy of Medicine, Engineering, and Science of Florida.

  • Photo of Bill AbertBill Albert, PhD

    Dr. Albert is Founder and Principal of Global UX Partners, a consultancy providing user experience research, design, and strategy services to global businesses. Prior to Global UX Partners, Bill was Senior Vice President and Global Head of User Experience at Mach49, a growth incubator for global businesses, and Executive Director of the User Experience Center and Adjunct Professor in Human Factors in Information Design at Bentley University. He has more than 20 peer-reviewed publications and has presented his work in user experience at more than 50 national and international conferences. He co-wrote (with Tom Tullis) the first book on UX metrics, Measuring the User Experience: Collecting, Analyzing, and Presenting UX Metrics (third edition published in 2022). He also co-wrote (with Tom Tullis and Donna Tedesco) Beyond the Usability Lab: Conducting Large-Scale Online User Experience Studies in 2010. He received his PhD from Boston University. He completed a post-doc at Nissan Cambridge Basic Research with a focus on cognitive demands in the use of navigation systems.