The elements that contributed to exploring the context of this research are discussed in the following sections.
3.5.1 Literature and resource review
The literature review positioned the research in the field of ergonomics, described the theoretical context and identified the gaps in the area. Study 1 differs from a standard literature review as the researcher was gathering and collating evidence from empirical research of other experts within various domains, who are involved in child safety and design, to evaluate evidence from empirical research (real-world sources). As discussed in section 3.4.5 Phase 1, the existing literature constitutes the units of analysis. The essential works in the relevant categories will be identified through a systematic analysis of guidance and tools aimed at supporting designers in designing for the safety of children aged 5 to 11.
3.5.2 Stakeholder interviews: Phase 1 (study 2)
Interviews are used for different purposes. Typically, participants are interviewed on a one-to-one basis, and the interviewer uses pre-determined probe questions to elicit the required information from the participant. There are three types of interview, namely structured, semi-structured, and unstructured or open interviews. In this study, semi- structured techniques were used to elicit data regarding decision-making among design practitioners. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with various experts. The interviews had two main aims of the interviews: to obtain an overview of design for young children’s safety and to understand designers’ information needs when designing risk communications aimed at young children. Interviews were carried out with experts based in the United Kingdom, Europe, and America. The data captured were used to help define the design and evaluation specifications of the risk communications toolkit.
Along with observational techniques, interviews are probably the most commonly used human-factors technique for information gathering. Interviews have been used in human-factors research to gather specific information in many different areas, including
70 system design, system usability, attitudes, job analysis, and task analysis. In terms of application times, a typical interview takes between 10 and 60 minutes. Kirwan and Ainsworth (1992) suggest that an interview should be a minimum of 20 minutes and a maximum of 40 minutes in length. In this study, data were collected through a series of 30 individual stakeholder interviews. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to gather in-depth information from individual participants (Robson, 2002). Although the analysis process associated with interviews is time-consuming, interviews were deemed appropriate for this research in order to gain better insight and understanding into designers’ requirements and perspectives regarding safety aspects in designing for children.
External experts in the field of child safety were identified through the Child Accident and Prevention Trust’s (CAPT’s) network of contacts, and this provided a framework from which to base the rationale for stakeholder recruitment.
Data were collected through interviews with three groups of people associated with design: (1) safety experts such as ergonomists and standards experts; (2) staff working as part of a design team without experience in children’s products; and (3) design professionals involved in some degree of collaborative work in design for children.
Template analysis can manage datasets of different sizes, ranging from a single case study to extensive datasets such as that used in this research, and was therefore considered appropriate for the analysis. This study involved a large number of participants in comparison to many research projects utilising qualitative methods. Finally, its use of a priori themes means that template analysis may be particularly well suited to this research, which has applied or theoretical concerns that need to be incorporated into the analysis. Interviews were chosen, as a series of interactive interviews with practitioners helps to articulate the key components involved in their learning design processes. The interviews helped to identify the areas where further support might be required. These discussions and the detailed analysis informed the initial requirements analysis for the toolkit.
3.5.3 Ethnographic research
Observations further consolidated the data obtained from the interviews, as observations provided the opportunity to identify how design tools and evaluation
71 methods function for the individual and the group and to explore what terminology is used and how support is applied in working practice.
3.5.4 Formative evaluation: Phase 2 (study 3)
Evaluation research seeks to answer questions about target audiences of designers. Background information can be collected before the implementation and assessment of the tools developed.
3.5.5 Questionnaire survey
Questionnaires can cover a multitude of aspects and they may be quantitative, qualitative, or a mixture of both. Questionnaires may comprise a combination of both open and closed questions, depending on whether participants’ answers can only come from a list of possible responses (Brace 2013). Questionnaires have been used in many forms to collect data regarding numerous issues within ergonomics and design. The research questions of this study are concerned with how designers select materials and why they do so. With such an open topic, a fixed design approach (Robson, 2002) would constrain the types of answers that the respondents could give thus this research did not use a fixed design. The measurement approaches used for the questionnaire design were an itemised rating scale and a Likert scale. Table 3.4 below shows the process of planning a questionnaire survey.
Questionnaires offer a very flexible way of quickly collecting large amounts of data from large amounts of subjects. Questionnaires have been used in many forms to collect data regarding numerous issues within ergonomics and design.
3.5.6 Survey design and rationale
Table 3.3 Process of planning a questionnaire survey (adapted from Cohen)
Stage 1 Define the Objectives.
Stage 2 Decide the type of Survey Required- cross sectional.
Stage 3 Formulate research, questions/hypothesis. Stage 4 Decide the issues on which to focus.
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Stage 5 Decide the information that is needed to address these issues.
Stage 6 Decide the sampling required
Stage 7 Decide the instrumentation and the metrics required.
Stage 8 Generate data collection instruments. Stage 9 Decide how the data will be collected- online
questionnaire survey.
Stage 10 Pilot the instruments and refine them.
Stage 11 Data collection.
Stage 12 Data analysis.
Stage 13 Report the results.
3.5.7 Limitations of interview and questionnaire data
Table 3.4 Summary of data collection techniques Method App
time Advantages Disadvantages Interviews High 1) Flexible technique that can be used to
assess anything from usability to error. 2) Interviewer can direct the analysis. 3) Can be used to elicit data regarding cognitive components of a task.
Advantages
Interviews can be used to gather data regarding anything e.g. usability of existing systems, potential design flaws, errors etc.
Interviews can be used at any stage in the design process.
The use of SME’s as interviewee’s gives interviews the potential to be very powerful.
The interviewer has full control over the interview and can direct the interview in way. This allows the collection of specific data.
Response data can be treated statistically.
Interviews are a very flexible technique. Interviews have been used extensively in the past for a number of different types of analysis.
Specific, structured human factors interview already exist, such as ACTA and the Critical Decision Method.
1) Data analysis is time consuming and laborious 2) Reliability is difficult to assess. 3) Subject to various source of bias.
The construction and data analysis process ensure that the interview technique is a very time consuming one.
The reliability and validity of the technique is difficult to address. Interviews are susceptible to both interviewer and interviewee bias.
Transcribing the data is a laborious, time consuming process.
Conducting an interview correctly is a difficult thing to do.
Questionnaires High Flexible technique that can be used to assess anything from usability to error. 2) Several established HF questionnaire techniques already exist, such as SUMI
1) Data analysis is time consuming and laborious 2) Subject to various source of bias. 3) Questionnaire development is
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Method App
time Advantages Disadvantages and SUS.
3) Easy to use, requiring minimal training.
time consuming and requires a large amount of effort on behalf of the analyst(s)
Observation High 1) Can be used to elicit specific information regarding decision-making in complex environments. 2) Acts as the input to numerous HF techniques such as HTA. 3) Suited to the analysis of C4i activity.
1) Data analysis procedure is very time consuming. 2) Coding data is also laborious. 3) Subject to bias.
The aim of qualitative research is not to obtain a representative sample via random selection (as in quantitative sampling), but to seek information from specific groups and sub-groups within a population (Hancock, 1998).