Identifying Hedonic Factors in Long-Term User Experience
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Identifying Hedonic Factors in Long-Term User Experience Sari Kujala1, Virpi Roto1,2, Kaisa Väänänen-Vainio-Mattila1, Arto Sinnelä1 1Tampere University of Technology, P.O.Box 589, FI-33101 Tampere, Finland 2Nokia Research Center, P.O.Box 407, 00045 Nokia Group, Finland [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] ABSTRACT According to Karapanos et al. [13], when users make product goodness judgments the pragmatic aspects of the user experience User experience (UX) arises from the user’s interaction with a (i.e. utility and usability) seem to be dominant only for the initial product and its pragmatic and hedonic (pleasure) qualities. Until experiences with a product; thus the relevance of the hedonic recently, UX evaluation has focused mainly on examining short- aspects (particularly what a product expresses about its owner) term experiences. However, as the user-product relationship increases over time. evolves over time, the hedonic aspects of UX eventually seem to Therefore, it is interesting to study long-term user experience – gain more weight over the pragmatic aspects. To this end, we have how the user's experience and relationship evolve over time from developed a UX Curve method for evaluating long-term user the early learning and enthusiasm about a product through to it experience, particularly the hedonic quality. In this paper, we simply becoming a part of daily life. While momentary present a study in which the UX Curve was used to retrospectively experiences can be seen to influence the overall product evaluate the UX of Facebook and mobile phones. The results show experience [2], the user's overall evaluation of UX is not merely a that compared to a questionnaire, the UX Curve method is more simple sum of the individual experiences [9]. effective for identifying the hedonic aspects of UX. This method can be used by practitioners and researchers who want to Retrospective evaluations of long-term user experiences are based understand evolving UX and to design better products. This on memories of the user and they can be vulnerable to biases [18]. straightforward method is especially suited for industrial contexts However, both Norman [18] and Karapanos et al. [16] argue that where resources are limited. these memories will be reported to others and guide the future behavior of the individual. The word of mouth that users pass on Categories and Subject Descriptors about the product to others is related to company success [20], H.5.2: User interfaces, User-centered design. while future consumer behaviors such as repurchase intentions are directly linked to customer loyalty [1]. Therefore, the users’ General Terms reconstructed memories of use are very relevant to the Human Factors manufacturer. Based on Vermeeren et al.’s [24] data, most of the current UX Keywords methods focus on single behavioral episodes and short-term User experience, long-term user experience, delight, mobile evaluations. There are only a few published user studies with long- phone, Facebook. term UX as the primary focus [15, 25]. Longitudinal user studies 1. INTRODUCTION are rare because they are expensive and impractical especially in User experience (UX) refers to the user’s perceptions and product development contexts. Long-term UX evaluation methods responses in regard to their interaction with a system or product that are easier to apply are therefore needed. [11]. As Hassenzahl and Tractinsky [8] describe, user experience In addition to the lack of methods for measuring long-term UX, goes beyond the task-oriented approach of traditional HCI and there are few methods for evaluating hedonic aspects of user focuses on hedonic aspects such as fun and pleasure. These experience. Yet, the hedonic aspects seem to be the most relevant hedonic aspects of user experience satisfy universal human needs in the long run. Semantic differential questionnaires [5] are but do not necessarily have utility value. The hedonic aspects sometimes used to evaluate hedonic aspects but they produce only create delight, which has been found to increase customer loyalty numeric results of how interesting, costly, exciting, exclusive etc. more than satisfaction alone does [1]. the product feels. These quantitative results do not explain the reasons behind the ratings, which would provide developers direct input on how to improve their designs. Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for Our aim was to understand how qualitative data on hedonic personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are aspects of user experience changing over time can be identified in not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that industrial contexts. There have been a few attempts to develop a copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy method for evaluating long-term user experience without the otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, investment and delay of a multi-month field study. In a similar requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. vein, we have developed a retrospective user experience Designing Pleasurable Products and Interfaces, June 22–25, 2011, evaluation method – called the UX Curve – that can be used to Milan, Italy. Copyright 2011 ACM 1-58113-000-0/00/0010…$10.00. qualitatively investigate user experience and to provide feedback on product features and qualities for design purposes. First, users Retrospective recall of personally meaningful experiences is more are allowed to express their experiences freely before they are lightweight than a longitudinal field study for both the respondent asked to consider their experiences from different points of view and the researcher. The problem of retrospective studies is that the representative of various dimensions of UX: attractiveness, ease of human memory produces biases in any recollections. However, as use, utility, and degree of usage. The users are asked to recall and Shiffman et al. [23] point out, retrospective impressions are very express significant reasons for changes in their experience while relevant to a person and can have a greater effect on later drawing a curve on a timeline. These reasons reveal meaningful behavior, since they represent the information they use to make issues that can be addressed in the further design iterations of the subsequent decisions. products under study. One example of a retrospective UX evaluation method is We tested the UX Curve method with 40 users to evaluate the user CORPUS developed by Von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff et al. [25]. experience of two different types of communication tool: CORPUS is an interview technique used for reconstructing Facebook and mobile phones. We describe the reasons found for changes in UX over a period of more than one year. However, it changing UX over time and compare the results of the UX Curve provides only rough descriptions of the trends of user experience to the results of a questionnaire. and few reasons explaining the causes of any changes. 2. RELATED RESEARCH Karapanos et al. [14, 16] developed iScale, a (not publicly available) online survey tool to minimize retrospective bias by This section presents related work from two main areas: namely assisting users to recall their experiences with a product by hedonic product quality and evaluating long-term usage. “sketching” a curve over time. The goal of the study [16] was to 2.1 Hedonic Product Quality compare the effectiveness of two versions of iScale and free recall Hassenzahl [5] describes hedonic quality as being related to the without any form of sketching. The study shows that sketching users' self, in contrast to pragmatic quality which is related to the increases the amount and the richness of the recalled information. users' need to achieve goals. Hedonic quality comprises quality However, the study did not include qualitative or interpersonal dimensions that have no obvious relation to the task the user wants analysis of the results. Thus, how the remembered experiences to accomplish with the system but instead are related to non- relate to the assessment of the product is still an open question. instrumental qualities such as, esthetics, innovativeness and Although memories are rarely accurate they nevertheless seem to originality [3]. Further, Hassenzahl [4, 5] subdivides hedonic be very meaningful to humans and they do affect product success. attributes into stimulation, identification and evocation. A product As shown in the psychological studies [e.g. 19], individual provides stimulation by its challenging and novel character, experiences have less relevance to humans than the retrospective identification by expressing one's self and personal values to memories. In this study, we use the UX Curve method to evaluate relevant others, and evocation by one's formation of memories [4, long-term user experiences of Facebook and mobile phones and 5]. analyze the amount and quality of UX information gained from Experimental research shows that both pragmatic and hedonic their hedonic qualities. The results are also compared to findings qualities contribute to the appeal of a product [4, 6]. Schrepp et al. elicited by a questionnaire. [22] show that both qualities also have an impact on the attractiveness of business management software that is used for 3. METHOD work purposes. The relative weights of the pragmatic and the To test whether the UX Curve method is useful in revealing long- hedonic quality in forming an overall evaluation of a product are term hedonic experiences 40 users were asked to describe their dependent on the users' motivational orientations and the context experiences by means of the UX Curve method and a of evaluation [7]. questionnaire. The effectiveness of the questionnaire and of the UX Curve method in revealing hedonic experiences was then However, the results of Chitturi et al. [1] show that the importance compared.