ABSTRACT
This chapter presents various aspects of usability testing and costing. It covers usability testing goals, limitations, and advantages; usability testing elements, test plans, and test budgets; types of usability-related tests, usability test performance stages, usability costing-related facts and figures, usability engineering–related activities and costs, costs of ignoring usability, models for estimating usability engineering costs, and problems. The performance of usability testing is divided into six stages, all of which are described in detail. These stages are test plan development, user-participant selection, test material preparation, actual test performance, participant debriefing, and data analysis and recommendations. Four models for estimating usability engineering costs are presented, along with some examples with solutions. There are 10 problems at the end of the chapter to test readers’ comprehension in this area, and the sources of most of the material presented in the chapter are given in the reference section. These will be useful to readers if they desire to delve more deeply into a specific topic.
