Designing Curated Conversation-Driven Explanations for Communicating Complex Technical Concepts

The need for learning about emerging technologies and technical concepts among the general population is increasing, but formal explanations from online encyclopedias, textbooks, and articles are often rich in technical jargon and can be challenging to grasp. In this paper, we explore a novel approach for explaining technical concepts to non-technical users through the design of JargonLite, an interactive dictionary that shows how technical concepts can be used in everyday conversations. We evaluated curated conversation-driven explanations with 12 users who had little or no technical training and wanted to learn about big data concepts. We found that users perceived conversation-driven explanations to be easy to understand and these explanations helped them to maintain focus. We discuss the potential of using conversation-driven explanations as a learning tool for non-technical users and reflect on the advantages and disadvantages of this approach.