Paula Simons

Testing Protocols

Project 2

Client Testing Protocols: Usability & Accessibility

Introduction
Arkansas Symposium for Psychology Students (ASPS) is a non-profit research conference with the primary goal of offering undergraduate and graduate students in psychology the opportunity to disseminate their work to a gathering of their peers. A secondary goal is to provide a learning experience for how to conduct research, research presentations, and questionand-answer sessions with peers regarding research. Finally, ASPS strives to offer students with an opportunity to make connections with community professionals in the various fields of psychology and with faculty from other psychology programs in the region.

I. Purpose
Over the last three years, ASPS has more than tripled in size and now extends to including students from surrounding states in the region. As a result, the need has grown to create an effective brand and maintain a professional and usable website to advertise the conference. The site also must serve as the registration and submission hub for the conference. As such, the site has many tasks which users need to complete. The final report should include assessments of how to locate the areas for registration and submissions, event information (such as dates and times), and location of the event (maps). The report needs to determine user satisfaction with logo and design as the clients are attempting to determine if branding is appropriate or adequate. A more complete list of all tasks and information provided on the site will help to determine which specific tasks to use.

Paula Simons

Testing Protocols

Project 2

II. User Profiles (or Personas)

Audience is primarily college students which can encompass multiple ages. As a result, user profiles should include users ages 18 & up, but with primary focus on 18-25 year olds. Also as this is a regional conference, some consideration can be given to backgrounds in user profiles which will reflect this (such as which state they are from & whether their university has had students attend in the past). For the majority, most will likely have computer experience, but vary the experience of having registered for conferences previously. The following user profiles were developed to meet these needs and will be used for testing.

ASPS Profile #1 Name: Sharone Hughes Age: 23 Education: Graduate Student, Counseling Psychology Occupation: Part-time Clerk, Starbucks Tech Skills: Is familiar with multiple forms of social media, has experience with several different Microsoft systems, has worked with different publishing media, owns and uses a Smartphone Family: Single, one child, multiple younger siblings Hobbies: Photography and blogging User Dilemma: Sharone is a graduate student who has been conducting research into developmental disorders in children. She needs to submit her work to a research conference for presentation. But first, she has to register to be a member of the organization hosting the conference and register to attend the conference.

Paula Simons

Testing Protocols

Project 2

ASPS Profile #2 Name: Phillip Jarrett Age: 25 Education: Undergraduate Psychology Student Occupation: Army Reservist Tech Skills: Has a smart phone and regularly uses social media Family: Married, 2 children Hobbies: Hiking and rock climbing User Dilemma: Phillip loves to explore on the computer and is returning to college to get a degree in psychology. He wants to be a counselor with the Veterans Administration. He has been conducting research into post-traumatic stress disorder.

III. Tasks for Assessment

The conference website has already launched and so testing will begin with the site itself. Usability testing will begin with the Homepage to determine if user experience from the first interaction with the site. The task assessment below will be used. Task #1- Homepage Usability Assessment

Welcome (Sharona), my name is (Paula). I would like for you to look at the homepage for a website and answer a few simple questions. You may scroll around the homepage but do not click any links and leave the page. Are you ready? Lets begin. Can you tell me what the first thing you noticed on the page is? Can you identify the name and purpose of the website? Can you tell me where you would go to find out more about the sites owners? Can you identify any categories for organizing information? If so, can you tell me (without clicking on anything) what information you would expect to find by clicking on each category?

Paula Simons

Testing Protocols

Project 2

Accessibility testing should focus primarily on language and lingo barriers and should also begin on the Homepage. As this region has a significant population of international students and English-as-a-second-language users, it is important that all instructions and vital information be clearly communicated. The accessibility task assessment was used for this purpose.

Task #1- Homepage Accessibility Assessment Okay Sharona, now I would like for you to answer some questions for me regarding specific details. Please remember to stay in your persona and answer questions out loud. Vision Accessibility Tasks: Can you zoom in or enlarge the text? Rate how easily read is the font. 0 1 2 3 4 (With 0 being completely difficult, and 4 being easily read) Is there a clear difference between the text and the background? Language Accessibility Tasks: Can you change the language on the site? Are there any phrases or words which you do not understand the definition of?

Following the assessment of the Homepage, the remainder of the site will be evaluated similarly using the protocol shown below.

Paula Simons

Testing Protocols

Project 2

Task #4- User Task Assessment So, (Phillip), I have a couple of tasks for you to complete using this website. I heard you are really interested in technology and would like to see if this site would work for you. I am going to give you a series of tasks to complete with the request that as you work through the tasks you explain to me your thinking process and any feelings you have related to the performance of the task. Okay? Lets begin. Will you please locate the registration menu and tell me which credit cards are accepted by the conference? Using the provided information, would you please submit an abstract to the conference? As you wish to attend the conference, what details would you wish to take note of and can you locate those for me please? Please locate the place where directions to the conference are listed? One last task, can you locate and name the sponsors for the conference?

IV. Results
Results will be provided to ASPS in an IEEE-formatted report along with recommendations for the site. A brief breakdown of methodology should be included, along with a description of data analysis procedures.