University students face a constant stream of questionnaires designed to assess the standard of their courses
"I'm more bothered by the underlying assumptions about what makes good university teaching that lie behind many of these surveys. You can see them particularly clearly in the National Student Survey, and the reams of student feedback it publishes online - explicitly, so it says, to help prospective students choose a good course, and to help universities 'enhance the student learning experience'. ...
OK, I can see how at first sight that might seem obvious. Who, after all, wants to see their kids go off to university, at great expense, for a diet of dis-satisfaction? But, from where I sit, dissatisfaction and discomfort have their own, important, role to play in a good university education. We're aiming to push our students to think differently, to move out of their intellectual comfort zone, to read and discuss texts that are almost too hard for them to manage. It is, and it's meant to be, destabilizing.
At the same time, we're urging them never to be satisfied with the arguments they are presented with, never to take things on trust, always to challenge, always to see the weak points, or to want to push the argument further. Then along comes the National Survey, treats them as consumers, and asks them if they're satisfied."
(Mary Beard, BBC News, 2 December 2012)
CONTRIBUTOR
Phil NoddingSHARE
Beyond Usability: Process, Outcome and Affect in human computer interactions
"Currently, our best theories are limited in terms of their applicability to design. However, we cannot retreat into the easy empiricism of current usability perspectives where everything is measured in terms of effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction. Theory building must occur if we are to have long term impact and the diversity of experiences users can have with technology are not simply reduced to these operational criteria. We need to stretch our conception of interaction beyond performance and simple likes/dislikes. I argue for a richer sense of user experience, one that allows for aesthetics as much as efficiency and the creation of community discourse forms over time as much as the measurement of effectiveness in a single task. There is much work ahead but unless we embrace these issues as part of our research agenda, then the study of HCI will forever be piecemeal and weak, and its results will find little positive reception among the many designers and consumers who could most benefit from them."
(Andrew Dillon)
Dillon, A. (2001) Beyond usability: process, outcome and affect in human-computer interactions. Canadian Journal of Library and Information Science, 26(4), 57-69.
[Dillon argues for a richer sense of what constitutes web usability and resists the easy empiricism espoused by most usability engineers.]
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: creativity, fulfillment and flow
"Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi asks, 'What makes a life worth living?' Noting that money cannot make us happy, he looks to those who find pleasure and lasting satisfaction in activities that bring about a state of 'flow'."
(TEDTalks)
Fig.1 recorded February 2004 in Monterey, California. Duration: 18:55
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
