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Mobile methods : eliciting user needs for future mobile products

The research reported in this thesis had two aims. To investigate how the variability and
complexity of the mobile context of use should be addressed when capturing user needs
for mobile products and to explore the role of indirect methods of data capture as tools
for eliciting user needs in a form appropriate for informing the scenario based design of
mobile products during the. earliest stages of product development.
This research presents a novel scenario-based approach to eliciting and representing user
needs in a form suitable for informing the earliest exploratory stages of mobile product
design. Within this approach scenarios are used to provide snapshots of actual or
envisaged product use that can be used to find a starting point for design when there is no
clearly defined focus for innovation. Scenarios are organized into sets using scenario
tables to structure consideration of key variables within the mobile context of use. These
key variables are identified as: mobility, emotion, social relationship and communication
purpose.
Three user studies were conducted using UK undergraduate students as the study
population. Study One explored use of schematic representations ('maps') of each
participant's social communications and mobility as tools for eliciting user needs, both in
relation to existing mobile product use and in relation to projected use of future mobile
product concepts. Study Two used a diary study method to explore existing mobile
communications use. Ways of structuring consideration of the mobile context of use were
explored and the effectiveness of the diary as a tool for eliciting user needs and for
scenario generation was assessed. Study Three extended the diary study approach to
include consideration ofthe emotional context of product use and to include pictorial
feedback of diary entries to study participants. These personal representations of product
use were used to further explore user needs and to prompt participants to generate
narratives describing motivations for product use suitable for presentation in scenario
form.