The usefulness of user testing methods in identifying problems on university websites

This paper aims to investigate the usefulness of three user testing methods (observation, and using both quantitative and qualitative data from a post-test questionnaire) in terms of their ability or inability to find specific usability problems on university websites. The results showed that observation was the best method, compared to the other two, in identifying large numbers of major and minor usability problems on university websites. The results also showed that employing qualitative data from a post-test questionnaire was a useful complementary method since this identified additional usability problems that were not identified by the observation method. However, the results showed that the quantitative data from the post-test questionnaire were inaccurate and ineffective in terms of identifying usability problems on such websites.

本研究旨在探讨三种用户测试方法在识别高校网站特定可用性问题（usability problems）方面的有效性，这三种方法分别为观察法，以及分别采用后测问卷（post-test questionnaire）定量数据、定性数据的分析方法。研究结果显示，相较于其余两种方法，观察法在识别高校网站上大量轻重度可用性问题方面表现最优。研究同时发现，采用后测问卷定性数据的方法是一种有效的补充手段，因其可识别出观察法未能发现的额外可用性问题。但研究结果表明，后测问卷的定量数据在识别此类网站的可用性问题方面既不准确也效果不佳。