The document discusses user experience (UX) and its significance in product development, emphasizing the importance of understanding user needs and limitations. It also outlines various methods for usability testing and user research, including remote testing, heuristic evaluations, and analytics, specifically within the context of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science (IQSS) at Harvard. Additionally, it touches on the impact of UX on the development of IQSS products and services, using examples from their website redesign process.

1. UX @
Elizabeth Quigley, Usability Specialist
equigley@iq.harvard.edu

2. “‘User experience’ encompasses all
aspects of the end-user's interaction
with the company, its services, and its
products.”-Jakob Nielsen and Don
Norman
“User experience is the overall effect
created by the interactions and perceptions
that someone has when using a product or
service.”-Leah Buley
“User experience (UX) focuses on having a deep
understanding of users, what they need, what
they value, their abilities, and also their
limitations. It also takes into account the
business goals and objectives of the group
managing the project. UX best practices promote
improving the quality of the user’s interaction
with and perceptions of your product and any
related services.”-usability.gov
What is User Experience?

3. Created by Peter Morville
http://semanticstudios.com/publications/semantics/000029.php
UX Honeycomb

4. Why is UX important?
Being concerned with the User Experience of your product:
● Influences the development strategy for a product
● Helps reduce costs and “surprises” after releasing
● Increases customer satisfaction
But most importantly, UX helps solve problems

6. Low risk & low cost starting methods
● Summative usability testing
● Google analytics
● Usability heuristics and usability checklist
○ www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/
○ userium.com
● Content review

7. Two tips to get stakeholders interested:
● Find out the bounce rate
● Record two people using the product to
show how individuals interacts with it
○ Note: use someone who doesn’t work on the product
and someone who does.

8. My favorite methods
● Remote, moderated usability testing
● Cardsorting
● Heuristic evaluation
● Competitive analysis
● System Usability Scale

9. History of IQSS
● Institute for Quantitative
Social Science (IQSS)
○ Established at
Harvard in 2005
IQSS!

10. What we do at IQSS
○ Our approach:
■ create an environment that encourages scholars from across
disciplines to collaborate
■ develop powerful statistical, computational, and analytical
infrastructure and tools
■ remove impediments to discovery by providing exceptional
research services
■ support and showcase innovative ideas through the creation of
scientific programs

11. How UX fits in at IQSS
Products: Websites:
● IQSS Website
● Data Science Team Website
● Research Technology Team
Website

12. How UX fits in at IQSS
● Need to make sure our products fit user
needs
● Research driven development
● Helps with planning development of products
and websites

13. IQSS Website

16. How were these problems identified?
● Google Analytics
● Usability Heuristics Review

17. Google Analytics
● Showed less than 6% of visitors to the site were
accessing our team pages
● Returning visitors rate was very low
● IQSS website was being used to mainly learn more
about our staff, faculty, and students

18. Usability Heuristics Review
● Used Userium’s checklist to determine
issues
○ For example: First impression. The homepage
creates a positive first impression and supports
conversion.

19. Other methods used during redesign
● Cardsorting
● In house usability testing

20. Cardsorting
● Open style: grouping stacks of cards and assigning an overall label
to them
● Kick starts how to organize information and content
● Great way to get stakeholders involved
● Review the differences between results of this and how website is
currently organized

22. In House Usability Testing
● Did quick rounds of testing with IQSS staff members
who use the website as part of their job
● Identified content organization and layout issues

25. What is Dataverse?
● Dataverse is an open-source software framework for publishing, citing and
preserving research data. GitHub - http://github.com/IQSS/dataverse
● Harvard Dataverse is a repository open and free to all researchers
worldwide to publish research data across all disciplines.
http://thedata.harvard.edu/dvn

26. The Harvard Dataverse Repository The Dataverse Network Website

27. Dataverse 3.6 to 4.0
● Summative & iterative usability testing
● Competitive analysis
● Mental models
● Understanding your user

28. Analyzing Findings
● Affinity Diagrams to determine behaviors
and patterns

29. Using your findings
Mock ups created by Michael Heppler, IQSS

31. Resources
● Coggle Site Mapping Tool
● Balsamiq Mockups
● Erik Runyon Carousel Article
● Usability.gov
● Nielsen Norman Heuristics
● Usability Checklist

32. Get in touch: equigley@iq.harvard.edu
Questions?