CS 6752 * Qualitative Methods for HCI Research * Spring 1999

Announcements

5/28/99 - Added the list of presentations for each day to the schedule below.
5/28/99 - Added the written version of the final paper assignment to the website.
5/24/99 - NO ASSIGNMENTS WILL BE ACCEPTED AFTER NOON ON JUNE 9, 1999 This is also the due date for the final paper which will be assigned in class on 5/25.
5/24/99 - More updates to reading list. That's it for the quarter.
5/6/99 - Updated readings through 5/11 and due dates through the end of the quarter. See the 5/4 lecture for more on due dates.
4/22/99 - Added the text from Wendy's 4/13 slides to the CoWeb.
4/20/99 - The picnic area is very crowded during my office hours. If you don't see me there, check in the Sun or NT labs nearby. - Colleen
4/20/99 - Updated readings & topics through 4/29. Added due dates for papers. Added rough outline of project deliverables. See today's lecture recordings for details on papers & project.
4/6/99 - New stuff has appeared on the CoWeb: people searching for project groups and an area for pre/post-class discussion of papers.
4/6/99 - Updated some readings & topics for next week. Shifted assignments to more accurately reflect schedule discussed in class on Tues.
4/5/99 - Updated the office hours listed. Added due date for observation assignment.
3/31/99 - You can view slides and recordings of the class generated from C2000.
3/31/99 - The website and CoWeb are now available. Post your first assignment (homepage/research questions) here.
3/29/99 - Important class announcements will be posted here.

General Information
Course Time: Tues &Thurs 9:30-11:00am
Course Location: College of Computing Building, Room 102
Instructors

Elizabeth Mynatt
Office: 256 College of Computing (CCB)
Phone: 404-894-7243
Email: mynatt@cc.gatech.edu
Office Hours: Friday 11-12, or by appointment Wendy Newstetter
Office: 131 College of Computing (CCB)
Phone: 404-894-9219
Email: wendy@cc.gatech.edu
Office Hours: Tuesday and Thursday, 11-12

Teaching Assistant

Colleen Kehoe
Phone: 404-894-6266
Email: colleen@cc.gatech.edu
Office Hours: Tuesday 3-5pm or by appointment
Location: Student Services area on first floor CCB (also check Sun & NT labs nearby)

Grading

30% Class presentations (approx 2 "formal" presentations plus classroom participation)

40% Project work

30% Individual papers (approx 2 short and 1 long paper)

Reading Materials: Papers will be copied and distributed in class.

Course Motivation
Our faculty and students are struggling with how to do HCI research addressing user environments and activities that challenge traditional HCI techniques such as task analysis and empirical evaluations. For example, the new computing in the home project aims at understanding what people do in their homes, what matters to them, and how advanced technologies can play a role. Likewise efforts in ubiquitous computing imagine a continuous interaction with computers and these everyday, often mundane, activities are difficult to capture and illustrate using traditional task analysis methods.
There is a diverse set of qualitative techniques, and their underlying analytic frameworks, that are incurring increasing attention from the HCI community. The motivations for these techniques range from desiring real-world information to finding new ways to understand social interaction and human cognition. In examining this space of research methods, it is important to remember that there is no right answer. The proponents of various techniques disagree with each other on surface and core issues. Our goal is to chart this space, exploring a number of qualitative methods and their underlying analytic assumptions.
Course Objectives

Students will develop an understanding of the various frameworks/paradigms that currently inform HCI work. Course readings will help to clarify the underlying philosophical assumptions that the frameworks imply including what counts as research, the questions asked, methods for data collection, the kinds of data collected. This should help Ph.D. students who are beginning to develop research plans.

Students will begin to develop skills in collecting qualitative data for HCI development. Specific skills will include ethnographic observations and interviews and modeling techniques for organizing observational data.

Students will understand the challenges of designing for new forms of Ubiquitous Computing technologies. The focus here will be on mechanisms for developing requirements for the next generation of computer technologies.

Syllabus (subject to change)
In fact, guaranteed to change.
C2000 Recorded classes are available for your review. This includes slides, annotations, audio, and URLs visited during class.
The class CoWeb (collaborative website) is where you will post many of your assignments. It's also a place for questions, comments, and other resources created by students for students.

Week Date Topic & Readings Assignments

1 3/30 Introductions, Motivations & Objectives Homepage, research questions/goals

4/1 Introduction to Ethnography
Hughes, Sommerville, Bentley, and Randall. Designing with ethnography: making work visible, Interacting with Computers Vol 5 No 2 (1993).
Hughes, King, Rodden and Anderson. The Role of Ethnography in Interactive Systems Design, ACM interactions, April 1995.
Sachs. Transforming Work: Collaboration, Learning, and Design, Communications of the ACM, Vol 38 No 9, September 1995.

2 4/6 Big-Picture HCI
Grudin, Jonathan. The Computer Reaches Out: The Historical Continuity of Interface Design, Proceedings of CHI90, April 1990, p. 261-268.
Carroll and Campbell. Softening Up Hard Science: Reply to Newell and Card, Human-Computer Interaction Vol 2, 1986, p. 227-249. Observation exercise (4 hours of data, description and initial analysis categories)

4/8 Big-Picture HCI (con'd)
Lowgren, Jonas. Perspectives on Usability, IDA Technical Report, LiTH-IDA-R-95-23, 1995.
Winograd, Terry. The Design of Interaction, In Beyond Calculation: The Next Fifty Years of Computing, year?.

3 4/13 So, How Did It Go?
(no readings for today - bring your data and analysis to class) DUE: Data from observations.
Develop fieldwork plan

4/15 Making the Familiar Strange
Implementing the Naturalistic Inquiry
Access, Entry, and First Encounters

4 4/20 More on Ontologies & Epistemologies
Morgan and Smircich. The Case for Qualitative Research, Academy of Management Review, Vol 5 No 4, 1980, p.491-500. Develop fieldwork plan (con'd), Short paper on analytic frameworks and HCI

4/22 Case Studies & Interviewing: How do you do this?
Mynatt, et al. The Network Communities of SeniorNet, to appear in ECSCW 99.
Mynatt. The Writing on the Wall, to appear in INTERACT 99.
Reviews of the above papers. DUE: 4/23 at 2pm - Research Plan

5 4/27 Contextual Analysis
Holtzblatt and Beyer. Contextual Design: Principles and Practice. in Field Methods Casebook for Software Design. Research plans will be returned; Fieldwork observations

4/29 Guest Lecture: Hugh Beyer
The one who wrote the paper we read for Tuesday.

6 5/4 Activity Theory, Situated Action & Distibuted Cognition
Nardi. Studying Context in Context and Consciousness : Activity Theory and Human-Computer Interaction", MIT Press, 1996. DUE: Short paper #1
DUE: Revised project plan
Fieldwork observations (con'd); Short paper #2 assigned

5/6 Technomethodology and Other Tongue Twisters
Dourish & Button. On "Technomethodology": Foundational Relationships between Ethnomethodology and System Design, HCI Journal 13(4), 1999. (to appear)

7 5/11 Green Monkeys
Newstetter. Of Green Monkeys and Failed Affordances: A Case Study of a Mechanical Engineering Design Course, Research in Engineering Design (1998)10:118-128. Analysis and prepare for interviews

5/13 Fieldwork: Round 1
(no readings for today - bring your data & analysis to class for discussion) DUE: 5/14 - Initial fieldwork & analysis

8 5/18 (CHI99, Pittsburgh, PA) DUE: Short paper #2
Followup interviews

5/20 Still at CHI

9 5/25 What to Do with All That Data
Lofland and Lofland. Thinking Units from Analyzing Social Settings, Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1995.
Huberman and Miles. Data Management and Analysis Methods from Handbook of Qualitative Research, Sage Publications, 1994. Final analysis and design implications

5/27 What to Do (con'd)

10 6/1 Presentations, Part 1

Museums
Metro Traffic
Coffee Cafe
Student Health Center
Programming Languages

Final analysis and design implications (con'd);Long paper

6/3 Presentations, Part 2

PDAs
Aging in Place
In-Place Information
Stinger Busses
Design Room
ME 3110

DUE: Final project report
DUE: 6/9 - Long paper (Due morning of 6/3 for graduating students)

Project-Related Deliverables
We will firm these up with actual dates as they get closer, but to give you a rough outline:

Week 4: Research plan due (Friday 4/23, 2pm, Room CCB 256)
Week 6: Fieldwork results due
Week 7: Analysis due
Week 10: Final analysis and design implications due

Last Modified on .
Problems? Questions? Corrections? Email colleen@cc.gatech.edu.

Week	Date	Topic & Readings	Assignments
1	3/30	Introductions, Motivations & Objectives	Homepage, research questions/goals
	4/1	Introduction to Ethnography Hughes, Sommerville, Bentley, and Randall. Designing with ethnography: making work visible, Interacting with Computers Vol 5 No 2 (1993). Hughes, King, Rodden and Anderson. The Role of Ethnography in Interactive Systems Design, ACM interactions, April 1995. Sachs. Transforming Work: Collaboration, Learning, and Design, Communications of the ACM, Vol 38 No 9, September 1995.
2	4/6	Big-Picture HCI Grudin, Jonathan. The Computer Reaches Out: The Historical Continuity of Interface Design, Proceedings of CHI90, April 1990, p. 261-268. Carroll and Campbell. Softening Up Hard Science: Reply to Newell and Card, Human-Computer Interaction Vol 2, 1986, p. 227-249.	Observation exercise (4 hours of data, description and initial analysis categories)
	4/8	Big-Picture HCI (con'd) Lowgren, Jonas. Perspectives on Usability, IDA Technical Report, LiTH-IDA-R-95-23, 1995. Winograd, Terry. The Design of Interaction, In Beyond Calculation: The Next Fifty Years of Computing, year?.
3	4/13	So, How Did It Go? (no readings for today - bring your data and analysis to class)	DUE: Data from observations. Develop fieldwork plan
	4/15	Making the Familiar Strange Implementing the Naturalistic Inquiry Access, Entry, and First Encounters
4	4/20	More on Ontologies & Epistemologies Morgan and Smircich. The Case for Qualitative Research, Academy of Management Review, Vol 5 No 4, 1980, p.491-500.	Develop fieldwork plan (con'd), Short paper on analytic frameworks and HCI
	4/22	Case Studies & Interviewing: How do you do this? Mynatt, et al. The Network Communities of SeniorNet, to appear in ECSCW 99. Mynatt. The Writing on the Wall, to appear in INTERACT 99. Reviews of the above papers.	DUE: 4/23 at 2pm - Research Plan
5	4/27	Contextual Analysis Holtzblatt and Beyer. Contextual Design: Principles and Practice. in Field Methods Casebook for Software Design.	Research plans will be returned; Fieldwork observations
	4/29	Guest Lecture: Hugh Beyer The one who wrote the paper we read for Tuesday.
6	5/4	Activity Theory, Situated Action & Distibuted Cognition Nardi. Studying Context in Context and Consciousness : Activity Theory and Human-Computer Interaction", MIT Press, 1996.	DUE: Short paper #1 DUE: Revised project plan Fieldwork observations (con'd); Short paper #2 assigned
	5/6	Technomethodology and Other Tongue Twisters Dourish & Button. On "Technomethodology": Foundational Relationships between Ethnomethodology and System Design, HCI Journal 13(4), 1999. (to appear)
7	5/11	Green Monkeys Newstetter. Of Green Monkeys and Failed Affordances: A Case Study of a Mechanical Engineering Design Course, Research in Engineering Design (1998)10:118-128.	Analysis and prepare for interviews
	5/13	Fieldwork: Round 1 (no readings for today - bring your data & analysis to class for discussion)	DUE: 5/14 - Initial fieldwork & analysis
8	5/18	(CHI99, Pittsburgh, PA)	DUE: Short paper #2 Followup interviews
	5/20	Still at CHI
9	5/25	What to Do with All That Data Lofland and Lofland. Thinking Units from Analyzing Social Settings, Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1995. Huberman and Miles. Data Management and Analysis Methods from Handbook of Qualitative Research, Sage Publications, 1994.	Final analysis and design implications
	5/27	What to Do (con'd)
10	6/1	Presentations, Part 1 Museums Metro Traffic Coffee Cafe Student Health Center Programming Languages	Final analysis and design implications (con'd);Long paper
	6/3	Presentations, Part 2 PDAs Aging in Place In-Place Information Stinger Busses Design Room ME 3110	DUE: Final project report DUE: 6/9 - Long paper (Due morning of 6/3 for graduating students)