Previous studies have shown a relationship between the use of communications technology and well-being, particularly mediated through its effect on personal relationships. However, there is some debate over whether this effect is positive or negative. The present study explored this issue further, examining whether the effect varies depending on the type of communications technology, and the nature of the personal relationship. An online survey was conducted with 3421 participants in three countries (Australia, UK and US). It examined the use of ten communication methods, overall satisfaction with life and satisfaction with four different kinds of relationships (close and extended family, and close and distant friends). Results indicate that richer communication methods, which include non-verbal cues, were positively associated with both overall satisfaction with life and satisfaction with relationships. These methods included face-to-face communication, and phone and video calls. Conversely, more restricted methods, such as text messaging and instant messaging, were negatively associated with both variables. Social networking was negatively associated with overall satisfaction, but not with satisfaction with relationships. The strength of the association between a communications method and satisfaction with a relationship varied depending on the type of relationship, but whether it was positive or negative did not change.

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There is strong evidence of the importance of good interaction design in the creation of intuitive-use products. However, there is also a strong indication, both in the literature and in the study with designers documented in this paper, that despite this evidence designers get little support in adequately representing, analysing and comparing design and user information. Since designers require a practical and relatively easy-to-use support tool that would enable them to better understand cognitive processes of users and evaluate the accessibility and usability of different product features, this paper proposes the Goals-Actions-Beliefs-Objects (GABO) modelling approach that can form the basis of such a tool for designers. The four distinct stages of the GABO approach are designed to assess and compare designers and users' understanding and usage of everyday products. The evaluation results of the GABO approach with eight product designers have indicated that designers find it useful and effective in identifying the key similarities and differences in the understanding of designers and users.@en

Designing technology products that embrace the needs and capabilities of heterogeneous users leads not only to increased customer satisfaction and enhanced corporate social responsibility, but also better market penetration. Yet, achieving inclusion in today's pressured and fast-moving markets is not straight-forward. For a time, inaccessible and unusable design was solely seen as the fault of designers and a whole line of research was dedicated to pinpointing their frailties. More recently, it has become progressively more recognised that it is not necessarily designers' lack of awareness, or unwillingness, that results in sub-optimal design, but rather there are multi-faceted organisational factors at play that seldom provide an adequate environment in which inclusive products could be designed. Through literature review, a detailed audit of inclusivity practice in a large global company and ongoing research regarding quantification of cost-effectiveness of inclusive design, this paper discusses the overarching operational problems that prevent organisations from developing optimally inclusive products and offers best-practice principles for the future.

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Ensuring that inclusivity is practised in consumer product design requires a fine balance between the needs of the business and those of the users. This paper explores ten best-practice principles derived from auditing the practice of inclusive design within BT, supported by over a decade of research on the uptake of user-centred design in industry. The principles described herein are likely to benefit other organisations operating under similar pressures associated with cost reduction and time to market.

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Users' initial perceptions of their competence are key motivational factors for further use. However, initial tasks on a mobile operating system (OS) require setup procedures, which are currently largely inconsistent, do not provide users with clear, visible and immediate feedback on their actions, and require significant adjustment time for first-time users. This paper reports on a study with ten users, carried out to better understand how both prior experience and initial interaction with two touchscreen mobile interfaces (Apple iOS and Google Android) affected setup task performance and motivation. The results show that the reactions to setup on mobile interfaces appear to be partially dependent on which device was experienced first. Initial experience with lower-complexity devices improves performance on higher-complexity devices, but not vice versa. Based on these results, the paper proposes six guidelines for designers to design more intuitive and motivating user interfaces (UI) for setup procedures. The preliminary results indicate that these guidelines can contribute to the design of more inclusive mobile platforms and further work to validate these findings is proposed.@en

Although different techniques for supporting the process of designing exist, there is, at present, no easy-to-use and pragmatic way of helping designers to infer and analyse product representations that users form in their heads and to compare them with designers' own understanding of products. This paper is part of ongoing research that attempts to develop an approach for supporting designers in identifying, during the early stages of the design process, whether specific product features evoke similar understanding and responses among the users as among the designers of those features.@en

There is strong evidence of the importance of good interaction design to intuitive use of products. However, the underlying issue is that designers get little support in adequately representing, analysing and comparing design and user information. This paper proposes a new data modelling approach for designers, which in four distinct stages enables to assess and compare designers and users' understanding and usage of everyday products. The preliminary results indicate that it can contribute to the design of more inclusive products but its usefulness in industry is yet to be properly evaluated.@en

Despite continuing technological advances, there are still many daily living products that are unusable for broad sections of the population, including older and impaired users. Therefore, in order to design more accessible and usable products, designers need better models that can predict how people with varying levels of capability interpret and use different features on product interfaces. The aim of this paper is to survey the background of modelling product-user interaction, discuss strengths and weaknesses of various approaches and focus on appropriate methodology to investigate inclusive interaction with everyday products. This paper concludes that a model of product-user interaction should include three representations of specific information: (1) what people want to do when operating a product (goals); (2) what people actually do while operating a product (actions); and (3) what happens to the functional parts of the product during the operation (objects). Further research is necessary in order to identify methods for combining goal, action and object approaches and developing a usable and inclusive model of product-user interaction.@en

In order to design more usable and accessible products and services, designers require quick techniques to better understand how people interpret and use different interface features. A triangulated study was conducted, including a literature review, an evaluation of existing models of product-user interaction and observations with twenty users of washing machines. The study investigated the formation of users' cognitive representations of products and searched for a simple and effective method for modelling product-user interaction. In particular, the study found that the appropriate representation of product-user interaction should consist of two elements: (1) information on the functional parts of products and how they work (declarative element) and (2) information on users' goals and actions (procedural element). The conceptual graph analysis (CGA) was identified as the most effective model for designers as it captures both elements of product-user interaction in one representation and it does so in a clear and simple manner. Further research will continue to evaluate other models similar in nature to the CGA model in order to find an inclusive model of product-user interaction.@en

This paper describes the results of a detailed study which included a literature review and twenty semi-structured interviews with product designers from a large telecommunications company. The company studied has a lot of experience in product design and consistently produces high quality, usable and competitive products. In essence, the study investigated the nature and structure of users' cognitive representations of products and the ways in which designers currently go about matching their intended design of products with the users' understanding of those products. The findings from the study indicate that designers have often very little time, limited financial resources, and not enough support to take notice of users' understanding of products as much as they would like to. Moreover, no appropriate tool for predicting inclusive interaction between products and users is currently used across the organisation. However, the interviewed designers expressed high interest in using such a tool. Further research will evaluate existing tools for modelling the match between the conceptual models of designers and users and find an appropriate tool for facilitating inclusive interaction.@en