Interviews, References & Internet Resources

Appendix A: Interview with an Older Novice User (February 2011)

“You get older every day. No one wants to get old. That's when the body or mind falls apart. Until then it is only getting older, and even a baby gets older.

I am enjoying my iPad. One problem is the lack of convenient user guides. My guru put me onto Wundermap and I think it is great. The maps show symbols and colors for such things as temperature, wind direction and velocity, or rainfall amounts but I cannot find a convenient guide. In particular the rainfall amounts show in a little bucket. I assume the measurement is inches, not cm, but have no idea what the time frame is. since midnight?, last three hours? This problem seems to be the case with every app. David, my guru, also put me onto GoodReader, which I am now fairly adept at using, but only stumbled into the fact the tapping the middle of the screen takes me to some controls. I also have Pages, which is supposed to be the Word part of Office, but I don't know anything about how to use. "Help" with all programs is seldom much help.

The computer is great when you know how but getting to that level can be very difficult. In particular I feel sorry for older people who have never had a computer if they try to get started. Kids get started without even knowing it. Learning to use a mouse, with right and left click and double click and scrolling wheel is not something that comes naturally.

I like my iPad but still don't know when to flick the page and when to use one finger to move the screen and when to use two. Spreading two finger to enlarge the screen is great but I have trouble using my arthritic fingers in this manner and really need to use two hands. David also showed me an app called Star Walk which will show what you are seeing in the sky from your time and place. Unfortunately I don't know how to use it. I can find "help" but I would like a basic user guide like you get with your camera or your printer that tells you what you can do in easy terms. I have downloaded manuals for my printer, washing machine, PTouch labels, Kindle, iPad, clothes dryer, etc., and have them in one folder on my desktop for quick reference, and use them fairly often.”

Photo Credits

Older novice user with struggling with handheld device, photo by Harriet King

References

D. Arias-Torres, “The Design and Evaluation of a Pen-Based Computer Interface for Novice Older Users,” Computer Science, 2006. ENC '06. Seventh Mexican International Conference on, 2006, pp. 142-150.

A. Dickinson, R. Eisma, and P. Gregor, “The barriers that older novices encounter to computer use,” Universal Access in the Information Society, 2010.

B.D. Jones and U.J. Bayen, “Teaching Older Adults to Use Computers: Recommendations Based on Cognitive Aging Research.,” Educational Gerontology, vol. 24, 1998, pp. 675-89.

R. Pastel, C. Wallace, and J. Heines, “RFID Cards: A New Deal for Elderly Accessibility.”

P. Rau and J. Hsu, “Interaction Devices and Web Design for Novice Older Users,” Educational Gerontology, vol. 31, Jan. 2005, pp. 19-40.

M. Zajicek, “Interface design for older adults,” Proceedings of the 2001 EC/NSF workshop on Universal accessibility of ubiquitous computing: providing for the elderly, New York, NY, USA: ACM, 2001, pp. 60–65.

Internet Resources

U.S. Census: http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/computer.html

“We don't have a computer. Are we missing out?” (valid answer)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/blog/2011/jan/28/do-we-need-a-computer

“How to use your computer” (bad instructions with no pictures)

http://www.easycomputertips.com/article-howtouseyourpc-thebasics.html

“Old people use a computer: the game show” on collegehumor (humor)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khhC5UkiNd4

“How to help someone use a computer” by Phil Agre (sensible teaching suggestions)

http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/how-to-help.html

David Letterman explaining that he doesn’t need a computer, 2006 (humor)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nw_oCDdlMms

User interface for older users (product)

http://bigscreenlive.com/content/How_It_Works.htm

Senior Net (service)

http://www.seniornet.org/

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