Abstract
In a usability study on a portion of the Census Bureau Web site, we assess how people of different ages search for specific information by evaluating performance and strategy differences between age groups. We collected usability metrics of accuracy and efficiency, including mouse click data. Eye-tracking data were also collected including eye-movement patterns in pre-defined areas of interest. This paper focuses on the number of fixations (whether participants looked at the correct area of the screen) and number of unique visits (whether participants re-checked their answers). Results show that on the hard task only, older adults took longer to make the first click when initially starting the task, and there was a trend for younger adults to have higher accuracy. All age groups re-checked their answers suggesting that users of all ages experience difficulties when reading and comprehending complex data tables.
Chapter PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
O’Connell, T.A.: The why and how of senior-focused design. In: Lazar, J. (ed.) Universal Usability: Designing Computer Interfaces for Diverse Users, pp. 43–92. Wiley, West Sussex (2007)
US Census Bureau: Computer and Internet Use in the United States: 2003 (2005), http://www.census.gov/hhes/computer/publications/2003.html
US Census Bureau: Reported Internet Usage for Households, by Selected House-holder Characteristics: 2009. Source: Current Population Survey, US Census Bureau (2010a)
US Census Bureau: Computer and Internet Use in the United States: 2010 (2010b), http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/computer.html
Pew Internet & American Life Project (2009), http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2010/Generations-2010.aspx
Chadwick-Dias, A., McNulty, M., Tullis, T.: Web usability and age: How design changes can improve performance. In: Proceedings of the Conference on Universal Usability, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (November 2003)
Czaja, S., Lee, C.: The Internet and older adults: Design challenges and opportunities. In: Charness, N., Parks, D., Sabel, B. (eds.) Communication, Technology and Aging: Opportunities and Challenges, pp. 60–78. Springer, New York (2001)
Pernice, K., Nielsen, J.: Web Usability for Senior Citizens. Design Guidelines Based on Usability Studies with People Age 65 and Older. Nielsen Norman Group, Fremont (2002)
Redish, J.C., Chisnell, D.: Designing web sites for older adults: A review of recent research (2004), AARP http://assets.aarp.org/www.aarp.org_/articles/research/oww/AARP-LitReview2004.pdf
Rogers, W.A., Badre, A.: The Web user: Older adults. In: Badre, A. (ed.) Shaping Web Usability: Interaction Design in Context, pp. 91–108. Addison-Wesley, Boston (2002)
Stronge, A., Rogers, W., Fisk, A.: Web-based information search: effects of strategy use and age on search success. Human Factors 48, 434–446 (2006)
Olson, K.A., O’Brien, M.A., Rogers, W.A., Charness, N.: Diffusion of technology: Frequency of use for younger and older adults. Ageing International 36, 123–145 (2011)
Fisk, A.D., Rogers, W.A., Charness, N., Czaja, S.J., Sharit, J.: Designing for older adults: Principles and creative human factors approaches, 2nd edn. CRC Press, Boca Raton (2009)
Brébion, G.: Language Processing, Slowing, and Speed/Accuracy Trade-Off in the Elderly. Experimental Aging Research 27(2), 137–150 (2001)
Strayer, D., Wickens, C., Braune, R.: Adult age differences in the speed and ca-pacity of information processing: II An electrophysiological approach. Psychology and Aging 2(2), 99–110 (1987)
Howard, J.H., Howard, D.V., Dennis, N.A., Yankovich, H.: Event Timing and Age Deficits in Higher-Order Sequence Learning. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognitio 14(6), 647–668 (2007)
Salthouse, T.: Adult age and the speed–accuracy trade-off. Ergonomic 22(7), 811–821 (1979)
Brébion, G.: Working Memory, Language Comprehension, and Aging: Four Experiments to Understand the Deficit. Experimental Aging Research 29(3), 269–301 (2003)
Mitzner, T.L., Touron, D.R., Rogers, W.A., Hertzog, C.: Checking it Twice: Age-related Differences in Double Checking during Visual Search. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting 54(18), 1326–1330 (2010)
Wechsler, D.: Wechsler adult intelligence scale (WAIS-III), 3rd edn. The Psychological Corporation, New York (1997)
Shipley, W.: Shipley Institute of Living Scale. Western Psychological Press, Los Angeles (1986)
Tobii Studio version 3.1.3.6615-RC (2012), http://www.tobii.com/en/eye-tracking-research/global/
Plude, D.J., Doussard-Roosevelt, J.A.: Aging, selective attention, and feature integration. Psychology and Aging 4(1), 98–105 (1989)
Craik, F.I.M., Byrd, M.: Aging and cognitive deficits: The role of attentional resources. In: Craik, F.I.M., Trehub, S.E. (eds.) Aging and Cognitive Processes, pp. 191–211. Plenum, New York (1982)
Grahame, M., Laberge, J., Sciafla, C.T.: Age differences in search of Web pages: The effects of link size, link number, and clutter. Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 46(3), 385–398 (2004)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Olmsted-Hawala, E., Romano Bergstrom, J.C., Rogers, W.A. (2013). Age-Related Differences in Search Strategy and Performance When Using a Data-Rich Web Site. In: Stephanidis, C., Antona, M. (eds) Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction. User and Context Diversity. UAHCI 2013. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8010. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-39191-0_23
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-39191-0_23
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-39190-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-39191-0
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)