Authors:
Sabine Prezenski
;
Dominik Bruechner
and
Nele Russwinkel
Affiliation:
Technische Universität Berlin, Germany
Keyword(s):
Cognitive Modelling, Usability, ACT-R, Tool, Usability Criteria, Usability Test.
Abstract:
This paper argues that important usability aspects of mobile applications can be automatically evaluated using
computational cognitive models based on the cognitive architecture ACT-R. A tool incorporating cognitive
models for specific tasks, users, applications and usability aspects is proposed. Explanations provided by
the tool for usability flaws are based on simulations of cognitive mechanisms. A use-case of the tool is
introduced, which is based on an ACT-R model that simulates how users search and select a specific target
in a hierarchical android application and predicts efficiency and learnability for average users. The model
has been empirically validated in four studies with two different applications. To fully automate the usability
evaluation of the use-case, two basic requirements need to be fulfilled. First, the application and the cognitive
model have to be connected. A tool called ACT-Droid acts as an interface between the Android application
and the cognitive model.
Second, the models knowledge of the world, which is application specific, has to be
provided automatically by using an automated user interface analysation approach. Therefore, the open-source
tool AppCrawler was extended to allow the extraction of the required information.
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