INTERACTIVE VIDEO TUTORIALS AS A TOOL TO REMOVE BARRIERS FOR SENIOR EXPERTS IN ONLINE INNOVATION CONTESTS
Claas Digmayer, Eva-Maria Jakobs · RWTH Publications (RWTH Aachen) · 2012
This article presents empirical results of a qualitative study on video tutorials for online innovation contests (OIC) for elderly people carried out in the interdisciplinary research project OpenISA. In the project experts from communication studies and linguistics focus on interface and help feature design with a high communicative usability. One research goal is the examination when to apply specific help features for elder users. Based on another study, carried out earlier in the project, barriers of the OIC use by elderly people are reported. The interactive video tutorial described here was created for the elderly with the aim to support learning and understanding main functions of OICs and to avoid the reported barriers. This interactive tutorial has been tested with senior experts. The results show that video tutorials seem to be an effective help feature for different groups of elder users. In combination with interactive toolkits the use of tutorials increases the time users need to fulfil tasks with a toolkit but reduces the number of errors. With respect to toolkits the demands of senior experts seem to be different depending on their Internet usage experience (low vs. high) and their usage profile (passive vs. active). Active dynamic users appreciate video tutorials to get an overview over main functions and to understand functions. Concerning toolkits they prefer solutions that allow them to use both the toolkit and the help instructions at the same time. From the findings recommendations for the design of interactive video tutorials on websites were derived.