A User-centered Approach to Websites Usability Evaluation

Abstract

Usability evaluation of interactive systems has been a topical issue in human-computer interaction. People at different times and places have attempted to evaluate software, websites, and other tools to ascertain their levels of usability. The essence is to indicate the extent to which such interactive systems are easy to learn, easy to use, easy to remember as well as to determine their effectiveness, efficiency, error tolerance, aesthetics and user satisfaction. The evaluation methods applied so far have not yielded desired results in the perspective of users. This work adopts a user-centered approach to usability evaluation of two Nigerian universities’ websites (www.unical.edu.ng and www.uniport.edu.ng) by applying a systematic methodology of involving users in performing set tasks (user testing) and using the tasks completion time as metric. Data collected from the tasks completion time were statistically analyzed for usability criteria of learnability, efficiency, and satisfaction. Feedbacks were obtained from users through questionnaires on areas where improvements are desired from the sites, and the design-evaluateredesign cycle recommended to the Universities’ Web Teams to amend poorly developed interfaces and contents. It is inferred in the paper that www.unical.edu.ng received more preference from the perspective of users due to its ability to allow quick tasks performance, fast downloads, effective navigation, error tolerance, consistency, and minimal background coloring.