Non-Univeral Usability? A Survey of How Usability is Understood by Chinese and Danish Users

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Summary:
When we are designing a computer system we typically take the definition of the term usability for granted.  We safely assume that a program aimed at business applications should be clean and effective, applications for the home should work but also have fun, and so forth.  Our definition of usability however can change depending on what culture we are creating the program for.

This paper outlines a study done comparing the desires of Danish and Chinese users and how they ranked usability.  They found that the Chinese users and the Danish users varied greatly on some key aspects of what they wanted from software.  It was found that the Chinese tended to desire more fun and more graphics out of their software while the Danish desired a more clean cut and efective approach to software.

It is worth noting that the Chinese made it clear that they would be apt to desire more graphics and fun out of their software even if it compromised the effectiveness of the piece of software.  This could have major implications on the design process if you were trying to target the Chinese market.  Many Asian TV shows that I have seen seem to suport this fact.  There is alot of jumpy graphics all over the screen without giving much information at all so it would be safe to assume that these desires would be mimiced in their desires for software.

Discussion:
This paper seemed very usefull and I found it to be very interesting.  There are many very major implications that come with this knowledge.  Assuming universal desires accross cultures has often been done but almost never with great success.  If we are trying to sell to another culture it is important to know what exactly they are looking for and what they will want to buy.  It was also interesting to see some hard data proving what I had already come to expect.

I wish the paper had focused on more cultures than just the Danish and Chinese.  Seeing some American and Indian opinions in there would have made a more balanced report.  I would like to see another report with that information in it because there could be big differences accross the Atlantic and we would expect Indian desires to differ if Danish and Chinese desires were so different.