AbstractsMedical & Health Science

Visual instructions for toddlers

by Antonia Hulha




Institution: Mälarden University
Department:
Year: 2015
Keywords: iPad; Medical app; iPad app; Toddlers; Participatory tests; Analysis of existing apps; Design; Interface; Illustration; Humanities; Arts; Design; Humaniora; Konst; Design; Informationsdesign; Information Design
Record ID: 1338615
Full text PDF: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mdh:diva-27790


Abstract

Together with a research group from Mälardalen University’s department of Health, Care and Social Welfare, a prototype for an iPad app was created that aims to solves some of the current issues in healthcare for toddlers. The prototype would then be used by the research group to test with toddlers and examine whether the toddlers’ knowledge of basic medical treatments was increased. Due to varying linguistic backgrounds and abilities, the iPad had to be completely free of words, communicating only through sounds, images and animation. In this study, a research question was developed: What design aspects of illustrations and animations make them identifiable and ensure basic usability in an interactive iPad app that does not contain any written or spoken words for children between the ages 3 and 5? In order to find the answers to this question, an expert review was conducted, relevant design principles were studied to learn more about usability guidelines and animation for children, a prototype was created and iterative participatory tests were conducted with children of the same age as the target audience. These methods showed that there is a lack of usability guidelines when it comes to designing usability for a young audience. However, the usage of an expert review method prior to creating an app proved to be an effective way to see different design strategies in action and evaluate them. The participatory tests indicated that the usage of two different gestures is challenging for young children, and that instructions for these two gestures have to be different from one another.