User experience and information architecture of the National Digital Library and archives of Iran: a usability investigation and card sorting

Purpose

This study aims to evaluate the usability and information architecture of the digital library (DL) website of the National Library and Archives of Iran (NLAI).

Design/methodology/approach

This applied study used an exploratory mixed method, card sorting. Data were collected by interviewing, observation, usability test and card sorting. By interviewing users about problems of the DL, eight tasks were predefined and users’ problems in the path were identified. Their satisfaction of the tasks and the usability rates were measured via a questionnaire. Card sorting was done to inform on the information organization of the website elements. The study population included all users of the DL of the NLAI in two groups: ten initiator users (public users) and ten expert users (librarians). SPSS was used for analysing the usability test quantitative data. MaxQda was applied for analysing interview-driven qualitative data. Qualitative content analysis, categorization (data organization and grouping) and determining main and secondary codes were applied as well. The sort optimal application was used for analysing card sorting data in the form of similarity matrix and dendrogram. For validating qualitative findings, triangulation was used. The internal reliability of the used questionnaire amounted to a = 0.87

Findings

Regarding the assigned tasks, new initiator users by consuming 367.67 s for registering and new expert users by consuming 403 s spent the most time. Task 2 ranked first in being incomplete among 40% of initiator users and Task 3 ranked first by 30% of incompleteness. Expert users had more unsuccessful attempts. Task 5 with the mean rate of 3.35 and Task 8 with the mean rate of 2.25 were the most difficult and the easiest tasks, respectively. Some usability components were rated lower than the moderate point. Only 30% of initiator users and 10% of expert users were satisfied with the website. A total of 12 categories and 452 codes were identified as main problems of the DL. The problems related to a vague perception of concepts and labels with 90 repetitions and digital source display with six repetitions ranked as the first and the last problems in working with the DL, respectively. The sort optimal package produced the card sorting results as a matrix similarity and a dendrogram. Card sorting reflected some changes in organizing information items. Interviews after card sorting emerged some new groups to be included, such as links to other digital libraries, shared databases in the organization and frequently asked questions.

Originality/value

The library’s website should be designed in a manner so that it can satisfy users with different traits. As the information technologies are increasingly developing, the importance of such a design increases for better service provision and effective competition.

Depositing Data: A Usability Study of the Texas Data Repository

Objective: The purpose of this study is to examine the usability of the Texas Data Repository (TDR) for the data depositors who are unfamiliar with its interface and use the results to improve user experience. Methods: This mixed-method research study collected qualitative and quantitative data through a pre-survey, a task-oriented usability test with a think-aloud protocol, and an exit questionnaire. Analysis of the quantitative (i.e., descriptive statistics) and qualitative data (e.g., content analysis of the thinking-aloud protocols) were employed to examine the TDR’s usability for first-time data depositors at Texas A&M University. Results: While the study revealed that the users were generally satisfied with their experience, the data suggest that a majority of the participants had difficulty understanding the difference between a dataverse collection and dataset, and often found adding or editing metadata overwhelming. The platform’s tiered model for metadata description is core to its function, but many participants did not have an accurate mental model of the platform, which left them scrolling up and down the page or jumping back and forth between different tabs and pages to perform a single task. Based on the results, the authors made some recommendations. Conclusions: While this paper relies heavily on the context of the Harvard Dataverse repository platform, the authors posit that any self-deposit model, regardless of platform, could benefit from these recommendations. We noticed that completing various metadata fields in the TDR required participants to pivot their mindset from a data creator to that of a data curator. Moreover, the methods used to investigate the usability of the repository can be used to develop additional studies in a variety of repository and service model contexts.

Usability Analysis of a Health Sciences Digital Library by Medical Residents: Cross-sectional Survey

BACKGROUND

The usability of a digital library depends on a myriad of factors ranging from the end users' ability to website complexity. Although digital libraries provide instant access to online content, offering an efficient reference platform, their usability is highly variable.

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to measure users' perspectives and usability of the digital library of the Saudi Commission for Health Specialties (SCFHS).

METHODS

A web-based questionnaire survey was conducted using a validated System Usability Scale (SUS) containing 5 positive and 5 negative items on the usability of the digital library. The SUS standard cut-off score of 68 was considered for interpretation.

RESULTS

The overall mean SUS score of digital library usability was 52.9 (SD 15.2) with a grade "D" categorization, indicating low usability. The perceived measures of attributes of the 10 SUS items of findability, complexity, consistency, and confidence obtained below average scores. Only item 1 relating to perceived willingness to use the digital library frequently obtained a score above the targeted benchmark score (mean score 3.6). Higher SUS scores were associated with training (P=.02). Men felt the digital library to be more complex (P=.04) and board-certified physicians perceived a greater need for training on digital library use (P=.05). Only the UpToDate database was widely used (72/90, 80%).

CONCLUSIONS

These findings demonstrate the low usability of the extensive facilities offered by the SCFHS digital library. It is pivotal to improve awareness of the availability of the digital library and popularize the databases. There is also a need for improved user training to enhance the accessibility and usability of the multiple databases.

Empirical Insights of Individual Website Adjustments for People with Dyslexia

The existing body of knowledge reveals that customisable websites may lead to an increase in accessibility and usability for people with disabilities. In this way, the main goal of this research was to investigate how people with dyslexia respond to a customised version of a website in terms of its effectiveness, efficiency, satisfaction and suitability when compared to the default version of the website. The customisation of the investigated website was enabled with the aid of integrated assistive technology that offers people with dyslexia the opportunity to adjust a website themselves in accordance with their individual needs, demands and preferences. They can do this by changing the parameters, such as font size, font type and contrast between the background and text. The answers to the research questions were obtained with complementary research methods and techniques, including formal usability testing, thinking aloud protocol, log analyses, questionnaires and interviews. The empirical results show that participants experienced more issues when interacting with the default website, and they enjoyed more benefits when using the customised website. Too much information on the screen, not enough graphic elements, issues with visual appearance and inappropriately presented information were identified as the most common issues when interacting with the default website. When using the customised website, all participants agreed on a better user experience and, as the majority of them reported, this was due to appropriate contrast and font size. Additionally, the majority of participants also expressed desire to use the individual website adjustments regularly in the future. The conclusions of this investigation are that the individual website adjustments used in this research can not only help to minimise issues, but also eliminate challenges that people with dyslexia have when interacting with a website. Therefore, the primary contributions of this research are the empirical insights of interaction with both the default and customised version of the website for people with dyslexia. Furthermore, this research also has three secondary contributions: (1) detailed presentation and application the general usability evaluation procedure to a specific target group (people with dyslexia); (2) recommendations to adapt the usability evaluation methods for people with dyslexia; and (3) the usage of quantitative measurement instruments for the evaluation of a website's usability and suitability for people with dyslexia.