Reflections on Temporal Factors in Interaction Design: A Study of User Engagement in a Platform for Professional Learning

Abstract

This paper reflects on insights from the design process and evaluation of an online tool for supporting professional learning in a higher education setting. The online tool was developed through an iterative user-centred design process to ensure that it supported the needs and goals of academics. However, findings from a semester-long evaluation study showed that it found relatively little uptake despite participants' positive feedback in post-study interviews. This prompted us to conduct a further analysis of our results, which revealed that our process had failed to capture some of the more nuanced factors emerging from the users' work environment relating to time and timing. Drawing on those insights, the paper highlights the need to capture temporal factors during the design process and offers three design considerations to better support the adoption of online tools into daily work practices.