Usability Professionals' Personal Interest in Basic HCI theory

Abstract: This paper proposes a way to identify professional knowledge in a heterogeneous HCI (HumanComputer Interaction) community of usability professionals, designers and researchers. The purpose of the paper is to help recognize different kinds of HCI professionals. The suggested framework relates individual experience, education and expertise to situational (short term) and personal (long term) interest in HCI theory. Interest in theory including educational and organizational background factors have been investigated in an online survey of 120 members of a Danish HCI community. An exploratory, multivariate analysis of the survey data identified relations between background factors and personal interest in HCI theory. In the conclusion, I present the two different kinds of professional knowledge identified in the survey and describe implications for HCI education and development of professional usability knowledge.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2003
• Where: INTERACT
• Authors: Torkil Clemmensen
• Keywords: HCI Professionals, HCI Theory, Heterogeneous Hci, INTERACT 2003, INTERACT 2007