A Conceptual Design and Evaluation Framework for Mobile Persuasive Health Technologies (Usability Approach)

Abstract

Persuasive techniques are recently being explored by computer science researchers as an effective strategy towards creating applications that are aimed at positive attitudinal changes especially in the health domain but finding effective evaluation approaches for these technologies remain an herculean task for all stakeholders involved and in order to overcome this limitation, the Persuasive System Design (PSD) model was designed but researchers claim that the model is too theoretical in nature and some of its design principles are too subjective as they cannot be measured quantitatively. Hence, the focus of this paper is to critically review the PSD model and popular models currently being used to evaluate the usability of information systems as usability has been identified as an important requirement currently used to evaluate the overall success of persuasive technologies. To achieve the stated objectives, the systematic review method of research was done to objectively analyze the PSD model, its applicability as an evaluation tool was tested on a popular mobile health application installed on the Samsung Galaxy Tablet using android Operation system. Exhaustive evaluation of the application was performed by 5 software usability researchers using the method of cognitive walkthrough. From the analysis, it was realized that the PSD model is a great tool at designing persuasive technologies but as an evaluation tool, it is too theoretical in nature, its evaluation strategies are too subjective in nature and the 28 principles described in it overlap with one another. As a result, the PSD model was extended with an integrated usability model and the fuzzy Analytic Hierarchical Technique was proposed theoretically to evaluate usability constructs so as to make evaluation of persuasive technologies more quantitative in nature and easier for researchers to analyze their design early enough to minimize developmental efforts and other resources.