Interventions involving simulated interactions aimed at mimicking real situations must be engaging to maximize their effectiveness. This study aimed to assess how a sample of middle school girls displayed behavioral and cognitive indicators of engagement when interacting with avatars representing game characters that were controlled by a human digital puppeteer. The simulation game, DRAMA-RAMA, is a component of an intervention intended to reduce at-risk girls’ sexual and other risky behaviors. We used verbal/nonverbal behaviors and surveys to assess the game players’ cognitive and behavioral involvement (N = 131). Participants perceived the game scenarios and interactions as realistic and the characters as similar to people in real life. Participants’ behavior indicated their involvement and interest in interacting with the game characters. Finally, participants tended to be appropriate but not effective when attempting to advise/support the characters. These findings have implications for assessing successful operationalization of communication designs in interactive virtual learning environments.

ABSTRACTCitizen science broadly describes citizen involvement in science. Citizen science has gained significant momentum in recent years, brought about by widespread availability of smartphones and other Internet and communications technologies (ICT) used for collecting and sharing data. Not only are more projects being launched and more members of the public participating, but more human–computer interaction (HCI) researchers are focusing on the design, development, and use of these tools. Together, citizen science and HCI researchers can leverage each other’s skills to speed up science, accelerate learning, and amplify society’s well-being globally as well as locally. The focus of this article is on HCI and biodiversity citizen science as seen primarily through the lens of research in the author’s laboratory. The article is framed around five topics: community, data, technology, design, and a call to save all species, including ourselves. The article ends with a research agenda that focuses on these areas and identifies productive ways for HCI specialists, science researchers, and citizens to collaborate. In a nutshell, while species are disappearing at an alarming rate, citizen scientists who document species’ distributions help to support conservation and educate the public. HCI researchers can empower citizen scientists to dramatically increase what they do and how they do it.

ABSTRACTSocial media usage during the recent uprisings in Arab countries has gained increasing attention in human–computer interaction research. This study adds to these insights by providing some findings on the use of information and communications technology (ICT), specifically mobile media, by opposition forces and political activists during the Syrian civil war. The presented study is based on 17 interviews with Syrian FSA fighters, activists, and refugees. A first analysis showed evidence for some very specific use patterns during wartime (compared to media usage of political activists under less anomic conditions). The study also describes a fragmented telecom infrastructure in Syria: government-controlled regions offer fairly intact infrastructures while rebel-controlled regions have been cut off from telephone and Internet. Moreover, the central and very critical role of mobile video for documenting, mobilization, and propaganda is discussed.

ABSTRACTThe study assessed the usability of the Role-Playing Game-based Learning Framework (RPG LF) using the System Usability Scale (SUS). The test was conducted on a group of 35 undergraduates who played the sample implementation of the RPG LF. The study concluded with the respondents giving positive feedback on the use of the RPG LF for learning. Detailed probing into gender comparison and academic age group comparison revealed more details about the usability of RPG LF. There was not much difference between the sexes. Younger academic age group demonstrated more uncertainty compared to their seniors in terms of the usability of RPG LF. The study also factorized the original SUS data into 8-question Usability scale and 2-question Learnability scale, respectively. The findings were in line with the findings by other researchers that the 8-question Usability scale is a good substitute for the original 10-question SUS and is a better candidate in comparison to the 2-question Learnability scale. The study concluded that the RPG LF is a good framework to implement game into enhancing learning experience and suggested for longitudinal study to be conducted to assess the effectiveness of RPG LF.

ABSTRACTDespite enhancements in the visual complexity of in-vehicle information display in recent years, few studies have examined the effects of such increased complexity. We conducted this study with the following objectives: (1) to suggest a framework for predicting the perceived visual complexity (PVC) of in-vehicle information display; (2) to examine the effects of PVC on the visual behavior of human operators; (3) to investigate the relationship between preferences and PVC. A theoretical framework to evaluate PVC was developed, and a survey study was used to collect participants’ perceptions on visual complexity. A regression analysis was employed to find the relationship between each of three factors and PVC. Two of the factors—quantity and variety—showed a positive correlation with PVC, whereas the third factor, relation, exhibited a negative correlation. Visual search experiments were conducted to test the effects of PVC on the performance of visual search tasks and glance behavior. The results showed that the high level of PVC leads to more time-on-task and number of fixations. We also found that preference for in-vehicle information displays was inversely proportional to PVC. The results enable us to predict how human operators perceive visual complexity and explain the influence of PVC on human behavior.

ABSTRACTIn recent years, as the amount of data grows, personal information management has become essential as well as challenging for everyday lives. Tagging, an alternative or complement to classifying into tree-structured directories, allows users to classify a single information item in multiple categories. Due to its flexibility, tagging system has become popular and a number of studies have been conducted. Most of the previous research investigated the quality of tags with various tools such as questionnaires. However, the actual usage behavior of tag-based browsing and retrieval of stored information has rarely been studied. In this study, we examined the effects of tag attributes on the user behavior in browsing self-tagged documents under personal information management settings.Three attributes, tag commonness, tag frequency and tag position, were identified. A controlled experiment with tasks of tagging and retrieval to trace users’ behavior revealed that the tags with higher tag commonness, higher tag frequency, and lower tag position were more likely to be used. The tags with lower tag commonness and lower tag frequency helped users recognize a desired document among a list of candidates. Among the three attributes, tag position was found the most influential. The findings of this study are expected to enhance the understanding of the quality tags and help information designers in building an effective tagging environment.

ABSTRACTThis two-stage longitudinal study examines how employee Internet abuse may be reduced by nontechnical deterrence methods, specifically via organizational acceptable use policies (AUPs). This study used actual employee usage and audit logs (not self-reporting survey measures) to monitor the web activity of employees. In stage 1, a mild AUP reminder sent to company employees resulted in a 12% decrease in employee Internet abuse. In stage 2, a more severe AUP reminder resulted in a 33% decrease in employee Internet abuse. For both stages, the AUP warning (regardless of severity level) resulted in an immediate and significant decrease in employee nonwork Internet use. Results indicate that the severe AUP treatment was more effective in reducing and maintaining lower levels of employee nonwork Internet use than the mild AUP treatment. Under the mild AUP treatment, employee nonwork Internet use levels returned to their pretreatment levels after only one week. However, under the severe AUP treatment, employee nonwork Internet use levels were lower than the mild AUP treatment and remained consistently lower than their pretreatment levels even after three weeks. These results suggest that nontechnical deterrence methods in the form of organizational IT use policies may constitute an effective approach to reducing employee Internet abuse, particularly if AUP policies are clear with regard to related sanctions and penalties for employee noncompliance.

ABSTRACTGamification is the use of video-game mechanics and elements in nongame contexts to enhance user engagement and performance. The purpose of this study is to conduct a systematic review to have an in-depth investigation into the existing gamification solutions targeted at solving user engagement problems in different categories of software. We carried out this systematic review by proposing a framework of gamifying process, which is the basis for comparison of existing gamification solutions. In order to report the review, the primary studies are categorized according to the following: a) gamified software and their platforms; b) elements of the gamifying process; c) gamification solutions in each software type; d) gamification solutions for software user engagement problems; e) gamification solutions in general; and f) effects of gamification on software user engagement and performance. Based on the search procedure and criteria, a total of 78 primary studies were extracted. Most of the studies focused on educational and social software, which were developed for web or mobile platforms. We concluded that the number of studies on motivating users to use software content, solving problems in learning software, and using real identity is very limited. Furthermore, few studies have been carried out on gamifying the following software categories: productivity software, cloud storage, utility software, entertainment software, search engine software, tool software, fitness software, software engineering, information worker software, and health-care software. In addition, a large number of gamification solutions are relatively simple and require improvement. Thus, for future studies, researchers can work on the items discovered in this review; they can improve the quality of the current gamified systems by using a wide variety of game mechanics and interface elements, utilizing a combination of contextual types of rewards and giving users the ability to use received rewards “in-game” and “out-game.”

ABSTRACTWith the prevalence of mobile social network services, people can post location-based questions on their social networks to satisfy their needs anytime anywhere. In this article, the authors study location-based questions that people post on microblogs, which is a popular form of social network service. The authors collected posts with geo-tags from Sina Weibo and conducted the study based on about a thousand location-based questions. Their results reveal unique characteristics of location-based questions by analyzing what people ask, how they ask, why they ask, and the context when asking. Location-based questions are closely related to people’s offline activities. Spatial restriction, subjectivity, interactivity, and propagation are the main characteristics that people value for choosing social networks to ask location-based questions. People also apply different phrasing skills to different types of questions. The questions people ask in different contexts also have different focuses. Based on their findings, the authors discuss practical design implications for social networks, location-based Q&A systems, and other applications with location-based features.

Since the introduction of smartphones in South Korea, users have shown quick and positive responses to them. This study explores issues in user satisfaction and develops strategies for user retention of a specific mobile telecommunications service provider in Korea. We presented a face-to-face questionnaire to 4398 participants representing nationwide characteristics of Korean users. Mobile telecommunications services and features were divided into two factors based on benefit segmentation and were analyzed with user profiling. Users’ responses to mobile telecommunications services were characterized as “Fundamental services and functions,” which meet users’ basic and traditional expectations for a smartphone as a communication and media tool, and “Cost and monetary benefits,” which mobile telecommunications providers offer to attract users. Based on the scores for those two factors, we divided respondents into five groups and addressed their characteristics in terms of demographic features, subscription duration, and factors that influence user satisfaction. The results of our analysis suggest strategies mobile communications providers can develop for each segment to promote high satisfaction and increase user retention. To improve satisfaction levels, relatively more efforts need to be invested in the fundamental services and functions.