Assessing Usability Testing for People Living with Dementia

This paper reports on a study that examines the value of several common usability testing protocols, methods and metrics when used to evaluate the usability of a new personalised reminiscence ‘app’. The app, called ‘InspireD’, is a bespoke app designed to support personalised reminiscence for people living with dementia. The study focused on determining the value of commonly used methods for evaluating usability of apps designed for use by people living with dementia and their caregivers. The study indicated that observation and recording of task completion rates and times produced the most reliable results. The think-aloud methodology was difficult for the people living with dementia and did not produce any reliable data. Thinking-aloud whilst doing a task may have been a distraction since it requires a higher cognitive load. The systematic usability scale score which is derived from a post-test instrument is not reliable, as it had no association with the task completion times.