Generalizable user-interface research

A high-quality, friendly user interface can and does affect how users perceive a producT's quality. Human-factors specialists have been using a variety of methods to bring behavioral data into the process of specifying and evaluating user-interface design. Empirical studies are often used to evaluate design issues for a specific product, but we have found that more generic studies can influence a wider variety of products. In this paper, we describe three such generic user-interface studies whose results led to new product-specific user interfaces. Although each of these studies was done for a specific product, the findings have also proved useful for a wide variety of telecommunications products.