Summary of Think Alouds

This summary of feedback comes from 6 think alouds, made with mostly young people.

The first page:

The first page is not needed, because of the app’s inclusion in (some existing app).

The lightstrip:

It wasn’t clear if the dots on the passenger density lightstrip corresponded to the doors or something else on the train. Overall it was unclear where on the picture of the train in the app corresponded to on the train in reality. The lightstrip was usually not noticed until much later, or not understood at all.

Do people know where to click?

We aren’t sure if people knew intuitively that they should click on a departure to get more information. But when they have done it once, they will know and remember to next time.

Type of carriage

Almost every test person thought this was unnecessary information. The size of the information is a bit missprioritized as the information about the train being late is more interesting than the type of carriage.

The map

Most people thought it was very hard to understand. For example, why are there several trains on the map when you have already picked one that you are interested in?

Loudness on the train-feature

Many people didn’t understand or click on the icon. Some thought it was to get the information read out loud so they didn’t click it. Some people thought the information was unnecessary since you would get similar information when seeing the passenger density anyway.

From this information we decided that some things were to be changed in our prototype:

• Remove the first page
• The light strip needs to be changed: Every carriage needs to be represented by a continuous line. This line will have different colours changing incremently between red and green (like a gradient). The line should not consist of dots, but be continuous. Also, make the strip slightly bigger so it is noticed in the information-view (but not the strip in the list of departures).
• Remove information about type of carriage and speed. Make information about the train status bigger.
• The map: Put the information about the speed of the train here. Only show the trains in the right direction, and those that are relevant to your trip (close enough to your chosen train, or are delaying your train). The trains that are not your train should somehow be distinguished from your train, maybe gray or faded.
• Completely remove information about loudness.
• Add some color representation on the information icon, so that it is clear if it’s delayed (red?) or if everything is okay (green?).