Understanding Human-Computer Interaction for Information Systems Design

Abstract

Over the past 35 years, information technology has permeated every business activity. This growing use of information technology promised an unprecedented increase in end-user productivity. Yet this promise is unfulfilled, due primarily to a lack of understanding of end-user behavior. End.user productivity is tied directly to functionality and ease of learning and use. Furthermore, system designers lack the necessary guidance and tools to apply effectively what is known about human-computer interaction (HCI) during systems design. Software developers need to expand their focus beyond functional requirements to include the behavioral needs of users. Only when system functions fit actual work and the system is easy to learn and use will the system be adopted by office workers and business professionals. The large, interdisciplinary body of research literature suggest HCI's importance as well as its complexity. This article is the product of an extensive effort to integrate the diverse body of HCI literature into a comprehensible framework that provides guidance to system designers: HCI design is divided into three major divisions: system model, action language, and presentation language. The system model is a conceptual depiction of system objects and functions. The basic premise is that the selection of a good system model provides dtrection for designing action and presentation languages that determine the system's look and feel. Major design recommendations in each division are identified along with current research trends and future research issues.

Human-computer Interaction and Management Information Systems: Foundations

“…For example, users' attitudes, perceptions, acceptance, and use of IT have been long-standing themes of MIS research since the early days of computing (Lucas, 1975;Swanson, 1974), as have studies on programmer cognition and end user involvement in systems development. MIS scholars have identified information systems failures as the potential result of a lack of emphasis on the human/social aspects of system use (Bostrom and Heinen, 1977), have pointed out the need to attend to user behavior in information technology research (Gerlach and Kuo, 1991), and have attempted to tie human factors, usability, and HCI to the systems development life cycle (Hefley et al, 1995;Mantei and Teorey, 1989;. Also extensively studied are IS development theories and methodologies (Baskerville and Pries-Heje, 2004;Hirschheim and Klein, 1989), collaborative work and computer-mediated communication (Poole et al, 1991;Reinig et al, 1996;Yoo and Alavi, 2001;Zigurs et al, 1999), representations of information for supporting managerial tasks (Jarvenpaa, 1989;Vessey, 1994;Zhang, 1998), and computer training (Bostrom, 1990;Sein and Bostrom, 1989;Webster and Martocchio, 1995).…”

A two-stage framework for designing visual analytics system in organizational environments

“…Thus, to perform a proper user analysis, designers must actively engage domain users and elicit the design requirements through extensive interactions with these users. Based on previous research in OL [24] and HCI [61], we summarize three typical focuses of the user analysis (Table 1). Task Analysis: Once user and context analysis have passed, task analysis is conducted to specify the tasks and workflows in an organizational environment.…”

“…Task Analysis: Once user and context analysis have passed, task analysis is conducted to specify the tasks and workflows in an organizational environment. In general terms, task analysis focuses on analyzing and articulating the nature of analytics tasks that are normally performed in a given organization [24].…”

Use of HCI Components into IT Courses

“…HCI is applied by educators, researchers, and professionals from fields such as information technology, computer science, management, cognitive psychology, and human performance engineering. Gerlach and Kuo [1] stated a need for researchers to study human behavior in the IT research. Curzon, Ruksenas, and Blandford [2] linked a cause of IT failures to a lack of focus on the socio-human aspects of system use.…”