Towards a solution to vocabulary problems in computing: a measure of goodness of fit

Abstract

Three experiments are reported in the following study which explored people's preferences for certain labels in the context of electronic mail and the extent to which such preferences may be indicative of performance using these. Two measures of ‘goodness of fit’ were used to assess the degree to which short labels describing typical service elements provided in such systems matched descriptions of these services. In Experiment 1 three different labels were tested for each of 16 services. The data showed that people clearly preferred generic over technical labels. This was confirmed in Experiment 2 which employed a different method of measurement. A simulation of an electronic mail system was prepared in a pen/paper format for Experiment 3 to assess the link between preferences and performance. This was found to be quite high in some of the tasks.

Keywords:

• Word preferences
• Electronic mail
• Pen/paper simulation