Avi Parush

Welcome to the second issue of the Journal of Usability Studies. In this issue: The issue of cultural issues and their impact on product design and usability have been occupying Aaron Marcus’s mind for a while. Here, in his invited essay “Culture: Wanted? Alive or Dead?” he is suggesting that, in spite of the great […] [(English) Read More]

Aaron Marcus

Is culture dead as a topic of interest to usability and user-interface usability and design professionals? One European anthropologist/ethnographer wrote recently that “culture is dead” and only of interest to people in the USA (who seemingly have little or no understanding of other cultures around the world). On the other hand, another (USA) usability/design professional […] [(English) Read More]

Sauli Laitinen

Abstract A case study was done to study whether usability expert evaluation and testing are suitable for game development. In the study, a computer game under development was first evaluated and then tested. Game developers were then asked to rate the findings and give other feedback about the methods used and the results gained. It […] [(English) Read More]

Michael Hughes

Abstract Knowledge gained from usability testing is often applied merely to the immediate product under test and then forgotten—at least at an organizational level. This article describes a usability knowledge management system (KMS) based on principles of pattern language and use-case writing that offers a way to turn lessons learned from usability testing into organizational […] [(English) Read More]

I-Fan Chou, Randolph G. Bias, Sheng-Cheng Huang

Abstract A usability assessment entailing a paper prototype was conducted to examine menu selection theories on a small screen device by determining the effectiveness, efficiency, and user satisfaction of a popular cellular phone’s menu system. Outcomes of this study suggest that users prefer a less extensive menu structure on a small screen device. The investigation […] [(English) Read More]