After graduation, it took two years for her paper to be published in the renowned Technical Communication journal, but that does not matter to former Communication Sciences major Marinda Hall, especially now that her article has been named `best of 2004.'
Marinda Hall currently works as a project leader for Interview-NSS research bureau in Amsterdam. Two years ago, she graduated from the Technical Communications research group led by Professor Michaël Steehouder in the Faculty of Behavioral Sciences. Her paper was entitled `Cultural differences and usability evaluation: individualistic and collectivistic participants compared.'
In her research, Hall tested the usability of a website using two methods involving test subjects with diverse cultural backgrounds. `I tested the usability of the search engine `Web of Finance' on test subjects with diverse cultural backgrounds. To get these subjects, I contacted international UT employees. That was a great part of my graduation work, because I got the chance to talk to a lot of different people.'
And the results?
`I used two methods for testing the website. With the so-called `retrospective think-aloud protocol,' people expressed their opinion of the website after looking at it. In the other method, test experiments were asked to evaluate the website using pluses and minuses. Afterwards, I examined whether the cultural background of the test subjects affected the results. My conclusion was that the `retrospective think-aloud protocol' is less influenced by cultural differences than the `plus-minus method.'
Trans. Jeroen Latour
