UNIT – VI

HCI MODELS AND

THEORIES
 Goal and Task Hierarchy Model
• Many models make use of the model of mental
processing
• In which user achieves goals by solving sub goals in
divide-and-conquer fashion
• Two such models are GOMS, CCT, TAG, etc.
• Consider an example, we want to generate a report
on sales of introductory HCI textbooks
• To achieve this goal we will divide it into several sub
goals

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 Goal and Task Hierarchy Model
produce report
gather data
. find book names
. . do keywords search of names database
<<further subgoals>>
. . sift through names and abstracts by hand
<<further subgoals>>
. search sales database
<<further subgoals>>
layout tables and histograms
<<further subgoals>>
write description
<<further subgoals>>

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 GOMS
• Invented by Card, Moran and Newell is
• Acronym for Goals, Operators, Methods & Selection
• Consists of these four elements
• Goals - User’s goals, describing what user wants to
achieve
• Operators - Lowest level of analysis. They are basic
actions that user must perform in order to use system
• Methods - There are several ways in which a goal can be
split into sub goals
• Selection – No random choice, but attempts to predict
which methods will be used
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 GOMS
• Create GOMS description of task of photocopying
an article from a journal. Discuss the issue of
closure in terms of your GOMS description

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 Linguistic Model
• User’s interaction with computer is often viewed in
terms of language
• Several of the dialog notations on linguistic ideas
• BNF grammars are frequently used to specify the
dialogs
• Models have been proposed for understanding
user’s behavior and analyzing cognitive difficulty of
the interface

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 BNF
• Representative of linguistic approach is Reisner’s
use of Backus–Naur Form (BNF) rules to describe
the dialog grammar
• This views the dialog at a purely syntactic level,
ignoring semantics of the language
• BNF has been used widely to specify the syntax of
computer programming languages
• Many system dialogs can be described easily using
BNF rules

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 BNF
• For example, imagine a graphics system that has
line-drawing function

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 BNF
• Names in description are of 2 types: non-terminals,
in lower case, and terminals, in upper case
• Terminals represent lowest level of user behavior,
such as pressing key, clicking mouse button, etc.
• Non-terminals are higher-level abstractions
• Non-terminals are defined in terms of other non-
terminals and terminals by a definition of form
Name :: = Expression

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 BNF
• The ‘::=’ symbol is read as ‘is defined as’
• Only non-terminals may appear on the left of a
definition
• The right-hand side is built up using two operators
‘+’ (sequence) and ‘|’ (choice)

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 Physical and Device Models
• Keystroke-level model
• Uses problem solving understanding as a basis for
detailed predictions about user performance
• It is aimed at unit tasks within interaction – execution of
simple command sequences, typically taking no more
than 20 seconds
• Examples of this would be using a search and replace
feature, or changing the font of a word
• It does not extend to complex actions such as producing
a diagram

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 Physical and Device Models
• Keystroke-level model
• Assumption is that these more complex tasks would be
split into subtasks (as in GOMS) before user attempts to
map them into physical actions
• The task is split into two phases:
• Acquisition of the task, when the user builds a mental
representation of the task;
• Execution of the task using the system’s facilities

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 Physical and Device Models

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 Physical and Device Models
• Three-state model

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 Hierarchical Task Analysis (HTA)
• Method of task decomposition
• A task is decomposed into several subtasks
• Outputs of HTA are hierarchy of tasks and subtasks
• Also plans describing in what order and under what
conditions subtasks are performed
• Consider an example, task hierarchy for making a
cup of tea
• The main task, ‘make a cup of tea’, is decomposed
into six subtasks

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 Hierarchical Task Analysis (HTA)

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 Uses of Task Analysis

Detailed
Interface
Requirements Design
Capture and
Manuals and Systems
Tuition Design

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 Manuals and Tuition

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 Requirements Capture and
Systems Design
• Task analysis can be used to guide the design of
new systems
• Requirements capture is the process of eliciting
what a new system should do
• Task analysis is not a form of requirements capture
as it refers to existing system, not planned system
• It includes many elements which are not part of the
system

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 Detailed Interface Design
• Top-level menus can be labeled after the top-level
decomposition, and submenus after next level, etc.
• For this, tree may be first reduced to simple tree,
thus guaranteeing that each object/action is under
exactly one menu
• Alternatively, more complex trees allowing AND &
OR as well as XOR branches can be used
• In this case, an object/action may be found by
several paths through the menus

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 Computer Mediated Communication
Email

Virtual Structured
Collaborative Message
Environments System

Video
txt is gr8
Conferencing

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