The rise of urbanization, overpopulation, and resource depletion in recent years has triggered interest in developing more efficient solutions that could offer sustainable development and improve the quality of life in cities. The increasingly wider and more advanced availability of computational power throughout the anthropic space—which saw the emergence of the so-called “ubiquitous computing” paradigm—has opened new possibilities for the design of smart cities. In particular, the emergence of Extended Reality technologies (XR), such as Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality, has provided a new interface to bridge the gap between the physical and digital realms, enabling immersive experiences and interactions within Smart City environments. This paper, based on three case studies at different scales of smart environments, explores the current and prospected relevance of XR to both design and experience spaces enriched and characterized by layers of digital information and sensorial interactions.

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Understanding humans are the key to developing optimal design solutions for product-service systems. In this sense, the experiential approach is in line but might go beyond typical Human Centered Design (HCD) methods in that it focuses on generating positive experiences that contribute directly to human well-being. Extended Reality (XR) showed the potential to replicate or simulate experience as a whole and gained attention from design communities. XR platforms confused design practitioners due to their fast-advancing amounts and relevant experiences. Hence, this study introduced two surveys on XR platforms to clarify which experiences they could provide and when to implement them into HCD processes. Survey 1 categorized XR platforms according to their key attributes and mapped them into the Experience Matrix. Survey 2 invented two designer personas and a fictional project to analyze barriers and strategies to implement XR platforms into design processes. Eighty-eight XR platforms were categorized into nineteen clusters, where creation and simulation had the highest numbers. Regarding implementing XR in design practices, the cost is still the key concern and there's a trade-off between software cost and assets purchased for different types of designers.

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For designing large-scale products like an airplane, engaging end-users in the concept phase is difficult. However, early user evaluation is important to choose the path which fits the user’s needs best. In particular, comfort-related assessments are difficult to conduct with digital models that are shown on a desktop PC application. Digital Human Modelling (DHM) plays a role in postural comfort analysis, while the subjective comfort feedback still largely relied on consulting with end-users. This paper applies a human-centered design process and analyses the advantages and disadvantages of using VR prototypes for involving users during concept design. This study focused on using VR prototypes for concept selection and verification based on comfort assessment with potential end-users. The design process started with an online questionnaire for identifying the quality of the design elements (Step 1 online study). Then, alternative concepts were implemented in VR, and users evaluated these concepts via a VR headset (Step 2 Selection study). Finally, the research team redesigned the final concept and assessed it with potential users via a VR headset (Step 3 Experience study). Every design element contributed positively to the long-haul flight comfort, especially tap-basin height, storage, and facilities. The male and female participants had different preferences on posture, lighting, storage, and facilities. The final prototype showed a significantly higher comfort rate than the original prototypes. The first-person immersion in VR headsets helps to identify the nuances between concepts, thus supports better decision-making via collecting richer and more reliable user feedback to make faster and more satisfying improvements.

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Ensuring surgeons are well-trained in various skills is of paramount importance to patient safety. Surgical simulators were introduced to laparoscopy training during the last 2 decades for basic skills training. The main drawback of current simulation-based laparoscopy training is their lack of true representation of the intro-operative experience. To create a complete surgical surrounding, the required amount of resources is demanding. Moreover, organizing immersive training with surgical teams burdens daily clinical routines. High-end virtual reality (VR) headsets bring an opportunity to generate an immersive virtual OR with accessible and affordable expenses. Pilot studies reveal that personalization and localization are key needs of the virtual operating room (VOR). They are therefore key in this study. The focus of this study was to explore the effect of different human factors, such as domain knowledge, culture, and familiarity of VR technologies, on the perception of VOR experience. A human-centered design approach was applied to investigate the presence and usability of a VOR. Sixty-four surgical practitioners joined the study in the Netherlands and India. The surgeons were referred to as “experts” and surgical trainees as “novices.” The VOR system we used is composed of a laparoscopic simulator, a graphic virtual OR surrounding, and an Oculus Rift VR headset. Participants conducted the “complete Lapchol” task with the VOR. Afterward, four questionnaires were used to collect subjective ratings on presence and usability. Participant’s qualitative feedback was collected using a semi-structural interview as the final stage. Results showed the surgical knowledge only affected perceived mental demand when using a VOR. The cultural difference would alter the rating on the majority of items in these questionnaires. VR experience mainly affected the judgment on presence including “quality of interface” and “reversible actions.” The interaction effects between surgical knowledge either with culture difference or with VR experience were obvious. This study demonstrated the influences of cultural differences on the perception of immersion and usability. Integrating immersive technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality to human-centered design opens a brand new horizon for health care and similar professional training.

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The medical care responsibilities are often on the shoulders of nonprofessionals such as captains who are equipped with forty hours of designated training every five years. However, this training is neither enough for the captains to handle medical incidents nor releases their stress during the treatment. Currently, captains have very limited support from a medical expert, only via phone call or email from the Radio Medical Services. Thus, the authors explored that how the two-way augmented reality (AR) can support the collaboration between captains and doctors for a better quality of care. A Human-Centred Design approach is applied in this study, including field study and user testing. The lean user experience method was applied with fast prototyping-testing loops. The main findings are AR played an essential role to boost confidence on the captain's side, and the real value of AR is in supporting medical skills like suturing and abdominal searching. This study serves as a pilot research, thus it was limited by small sample size and qualitative method. Improving the communication between the captains and doctors is key for future studies.@en

The usability now serves as a fundamental quality of a computational device, e.g. smartphone. Moreover, the smartphone has firmly embedded into our daily life as an indispensable part, so the context and style that user may interact with them are largely different from a decade ago. Nowadays, testing usability with end user has become a common sense. Thus, how valid a usability evaluation method could assess the ‘extent to which a product can be used by specified users’ (ISO 9241-11) to facilitate software design becomes an interesting question to explore. In this research, three usability evaluation methods are compared. Among these methods, IsoMetrics is a standard questionnaire aiming at offer usability data for summative and formative evaluation; SUMI aims to assess quality of software product from end users perspective; User Model Checklist is a method based on user’s cognition-motor chain in specific tasks. The coverage and amount of usability issues, user’s effort of evaluation and software developer’s feedback on evaluation result are compared under a simulated usability test on SMS function with a smartphone. The result indicate that User Model Checklist could cover 90.4% of the usability issues found by IsoMetrics and SUMI, while 26.3% usability issues found by User Model Checklist could not be covered by IsoMetrics and SUMI. Users put highest effort on accomplish IsoMetrics and lowest effort on User Model Checklist. Moreover, the feedbacks from the developers show that the User Model Checklist requires lower usability knowledge, offers clearer improvement points and supports detailed design better.

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The study investigated the extent to which electronic voting is accessible to Dutch voters, especially the visually impaired, those with low literacy, and the elderly. Together with the different user groups, a series of electronic interfaces were developed and simulations of a vote-printer were built to run tests on large numbers of participants. The interface consisted of a card reader, a touchscreen and a printer; audio support was available via a headset. For participants with disabilities, the independent variables were visual impairment and low literacy. For elderly participants, the independent variable was age. All participants were asked to make specific choices on the screen and to check the printed result for their choice. As reference, they were asked to vote using the current Dutch ballot paper/red pencil system. The criteria used to determine the accessibility of both systems was: does the printed ballot match the intended vote? The vote-printer significantly increased independent voting by the visually impaired, however this was not seen for the low-literacy group. For the elderly, the use of a vote-printer with electronic interface is equally as accessible as the current paper ballot. All three groups reported using a vote-printer with electronic interface to be easier than the current paper ballot. The study confirmed that co-creating with intended users in the early conceptualization phase is key.

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Smartphone is nowadays the most prevalent computer system, thus a lot of attention from academia and industries has been put to evaluate its quality of use. However, Smartphone has more complex interaction modes and usage scenarios than PC and laptop. And therefore assessing its quality using a conventional usability evaluation is not sufficient. Meanwhile, the mental load serves as an acknowledged index of effort that operators have put in human-machine interaction, especially under high-demanding context. Mental load contains a set of parameters in multiple dimensions, such as primitive task performance, biological measurement(s) and subjective mental load scale, which assesses the efforts of tasks under a particular environment and operating conditions. Thus, it is suitable for evaluating complex mental work, and may indicate the use of Smartphones. The aim of this paper is to apply a multi-dimensional method to assess the mental load of users, and find out which measurement(s) is the most suitable one to evaluate the efforts for using a smartphone. During this study, the effort on conducting tasks with four difficulty levels were assessed using measurements in three dimensions, which were (1) user performance (task accomplishment and secondary task), (2) subjective rating (NASA-TLX scale) and (3) physiological function (EDA). The values of these measurements were compared across novice, average and skilled users. The results show that: task duration and number of usability error are significantly related with mental load and change with the difficulty level of tasks; in subjective rating, Mental Demand, Effort and Frustration were highly related with mental load.@en

BACKGROUND: The train toilet can form a barrier for those wishing to travel by train as it is perceived as being dirty, and therefore its use as being unpleasant. In addition, Dutch train toilet users have the additional issue of storing their hand luggage in the toilet’s confined space. OBJECTIVE: In this article, we examine the issue of Dutch travelers with hand luggage in relation to their use of train toilets. We investigate the type of hand luggage train travelers have with them and lastly, we study what travelers do with their hand luggage when using the toilet. METHODS: As part of an overarching study, we asked two specific questions on what travelers do with their hand luggage in a train toilet environment, followed by 22 observations from observational research. RESULTS: In the questionnaire, train travelers reported that bringing hand luggage into the train toilet is a problem because of the lack of storage space, and their fear of losing their seat. From the observational research, we noted that the participants mainly held their hand luggage on their bodies, and to a lesser extent, they placed it on the floor of the train toilet itself. None of the 22 participants used the hook to hang up their bag and/ or their coat. CONCLUSIONS: Travelers need a facility in the train toilet to store their hand luggage. Women have a stronger need for this than men, as they almost always carry an item with them. In addition, they use the toilet in hovering position or seated, with their backs to the wall, so they have limited space to store hand luggage on their backs or shoulders as men do. Most participants kept their hand luggage at a distance from the bowl, and the majority kept it off the floor (14 of the 22) because they were aware of the hygiene. The positioning of the coat/luggage hook at 1840 mm above the floor was considered to be too high, out of people’s comfort area.@en

This study identified practitioner-reported barriers to and enablers of usability in the development of electronic consumer products. Barriers and enablers are properties, situations, or conditions in the product development process, team, or context that negatively or positively influence the usability of a product. Based on a review of literature on user-centered design and exploratory expert interview, central concepts for studying usability in practice were identified. This was used as input for the case study, which was conducted at 5 product development groups in large multinationals, making (a) portable audio/video players, (b) personal navigation devices, (c) cell phones, (d) laundry care products, and (e) home control products. Data were primarily collected through interviews with 31 product development practitioners. Based on the data collected, case descriptions were created and more than 1,500 barriers and enablers were identified, categorized, and analyzed. The results of the study are 23 sets of barriers and enablers, of which it is indicated in which of the cases they occur, and accompanied with illustrative quotations from the interviewees. In barriers and enablers, a predominantly “outside–in” relation was observed, from the more external properties of companies (market, company organization) to the more internal (process, team, project). This seems to indicate that the user-centeredness of a product development process is highly influenced by the context in which it is executed. The results also lead to the conclusion that if the goal is to make usable products, one cannot only address activities that are generally considered typical of user-centered design, such as conducting user research and user testing. One also has to take into account how these activities are integrated with and supported by the rest of the product development process, which in turn has to be supported by the product development organization.@en

This study explored how usability was dealt with in four product development organizations active in different sectors: high-end automotive, professional printers and copiers, office coffee makers and fast moving consumer goods. The primary differentiators of the selected cases were whether they were targeting businesses or consumers and the degree of product complexity. Interviews with 19 product development practitioners were conducted, focussing on three topics: 1) the product development process and the integration of user involvement, 2) multidisciplinary teamwork, and 3) organizational attitude towards usability. Based on the interviews, context descriptions of the companies were created and barriers and enablers for usability were identified. To verify the findings and to discuss remaining issues a feedback workshop was held in which the primary contact from each company participated. The results indicate that differences in product–market combination lead to differences in organizational attitude towards usability. The prioritization of usability in an organization seems to be influenced by the degree of product complexity (complex products are more prone to suffer from usability issues) and whether developers think that usability is a purchase consideration for their clients. The product–market combination a company targets also affects the methods for user-centred design that a company can apply and that are relevant. What methods for user-centred design are used also seems to be influenced by the attitude towards usability: if usability is considered more important, methods that require more resources can be applied.@en