Considerations with Multitasking

Katherine Anthony Reading Reaction, Week 2 - through the eyes of a journalist COLLAPSE I found the “Cognitive control in media multitaskers” reading to be extremely interesting – especially because my area of emphasis is in journalism. We have frequent discussions about the evolution of multitasking in media and the impact that has on attention span. From a content perspective, we write to appeal to an audience that has a short attention span and who is likely preoccupied and just wants the down and dirty facts. That’s where the inverted pyramid comes into play – most important details at the top and information becomes less important further down the piece.

Poetry is said to make the mysterious familiar and the familiar mysterious.

Mahmood Ramezani 

Summary and reaction!

COLLAPSE

Cognition – exploring the science of the mind

The author believes that we need a lot of background knowledge for understanding even a simple short story. Indeed cognition is really complicated, even it doesn't seem so. Also he categorizes our knowledge into generic and episodic. He also shows how vital memory is in our daily life and "without a memory, there is no self", he states.

Rehearsal Loop and an Example of the Usability Testing Process

Shelby Gosa 

Week 1 Reading Reaction

COLLAPSE

From reading the week 1 articles, it is clear to me that I did not understand the cognitive psychology aspect of HCI. There is so much more to product design than I ever thought possible. One aspect that I noted was the article discussing the impact that accidents and mishaps have on companies. I did not foresee such a large monetary impact on a company that was unrelated to lawsuits, but after reading it, it makes sense that things would need to be drastically changed to prevent such issues from happening again. I never imagined those changes costing a company so much money. Through this, I have gained a new appreciation for the necessity of human factor reviewing and trying to prevent operator error. I will also be able to better appreciate these things in my own element of biology.

The Software Development Tripod of Successful Team Work

Claire Davison 

Week 1 Readings

COLLAPSE

Dix, Finlay, Aboud & Beale’s Introduction to Human Computer interaction begins by discussing what make a usable design. The components that are presented as necessary to make a computer system usable are aligned with Neilson’s Heuristics, which have been presented in other ISU HCI classes and are commonly used as a guideline for a user interface heuristic evaluation. While the chapter does state that HCI is an inter-disciplinary field, it puts a heavy emphasis on computer science. This idea has shown up in other readings and mentioned in discussions before but through experience, research and presentations from experts in the field; I believe otherwise. The authors do identify themselves as computer scientists and acknowledge that their view is not shared by everyone in the field; but I believe an HCI team with members who felt that one discipline was more important than the other would suffer compared to a team who believed each psychology, design, and computer science or engineering were equal “legs” in a tripod.

Software Development Risk Management: Is Training Enough?

Rafael Robles 

Week 1 - Wickens Ch. 1

COLLAPSE

Chapter 1 of WIckens is an introduction to applied psychology and the goals of Human Factors. Where I work, there have been a few software tools acquired to replace the existing systems. These tools are designed for users from a variety of backgrounds and use cases. It is interesting to see how the software through the lens of human factors and HCI.

Hamburger Menus

What are Hamburger Menus?

Hamburger button

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Screenshot of Wikipedia mobile app with hamburger icon and opened menu

The hamburger menu is a symbol consisting of three parallel horizontal lines (displayed as ☰) that is used as a button in graphical user interfaces. It is often displayed in the top left or top right of a user interface.^[1] It is called a "hamburger button" for its resemblance to a hamburger.^[2]

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  "Hamburger" menu icon example
 
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  A hamburger for reference.

Selection of a hamburger button typically results in a menu of pages or options. Hamburger buttons have been criticized by TechCrunch as a "poor design choice" in apps for mobile devices.

Rekindling the Discussion

From slack #general:

UX / HCI related items

[12:08]
hidden nav reduces overall user engagement 2014 http://thenextweb.com/dd/2014/04/08/ux-designers-side-drawer-navigation-costing-half-user-engagement/

Academics, Doctors, and Superego

Arah Dauer Wk 1 Reading Reaction

COLLAPSE

This week's reading included a chapter that had a significant amount of cognitive psychology covered. Since HCI is really a marriage of the creative as well as the scientific, I am glad that the Science of the Mind chapter went into such detail regarding the experimentation on humans and their inner ear and central executive. Initially, the discussion of cognitive psychology's roots in introspection made me think there would be a lack of scientific principle in the field. However after the contrast of current practices of experimentation my fears subsided.

Academia: conflicting emotions behind the moments of clarity

Katherine Anthony 

Katie Anthony_Introduction

COLLAPSE

Hi all! 

My name is Katie Anthony (though you'll see my name is Katherine - I'll answer to either) and this is my first HCI course. I am a second-year graduate student in journalism and my thesis focus will be centering around the older adult, clinically depressed population and their interactions with technology - specifically networking sites for socializing. While I think most of us can say things like "well this population just doesn't understand the technology and it scares them", there isn't much talk about the interface building and the audience impact. I'm very eager to be a part of this class and strengthen my knowledge and thesis "claims". Outside of journalism, I'm fairly involved in the School of Education as their communications graduate assistant and I am also the newsletter editor/creator for the Central Iowa chapter of NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness). I'm excited to discuss and work with you all!

Katie,

We have very different focuses but I've seen a lot lately related to helping the elderly become more engaged via new technology. I think it is a great cause. When I was younger, say middle school or high school age, I used to volunteer a lot for local retirement communities. We would visit once a week and play games, chat, paint nails, and just have very simple but engaging interactions with the residents. One year, one of the places I volunteered for had an area for adults with dementia or Alzheimers. A lot of the conversations we would have would be very repetitive, but sometimes they would remember things, especially a particular patient who kept a diary of sorts. I wonder how networking sites might help them to at least maintain or engage with family. For some people, it's a lot like living in dorms, but for others they feel trapped.