Verbal and pictorial single-item scales are as good as their 10-item counterparts for measuring perceived usability

Abstract

Single-item scales of perceived usability are attractive due to their efficiency and non-verbal scales are attractive because they enable collecting data from individuals irrespective of their language proficiency. We tested experimentally whether single-item verbal and pictorial scales can compete with their 10-item counterparts at reflecting the difference in usability between well-designed and poorly designed systems. N = 1079 (Experiment 1) and N = 1092 (Experiment 2) participants worked with two systems whose usability was experimentally manipulated. Perceived usability was assessed using the 10-item System Usability Scale, the single-item Adjective Rating Scale, the 10-item Pictorial System Usability Scale and the Pictorial Single-Item Usability Scale. The single-item scales reflect the difference in usability as good as their 10-item counterparts. The pictorial scales are nearly as valid as their verbal counterparts. The single-item Adjective Rating Scale and the Pictorial Single-Item Usability Scale are thus efficient and valid alternatives to their 10-item counterparts.

Practitioner summary

Verbal and pictorial single-item perceived-usability scales are viable alternatives to their 10-item counterparts. Specifically, the single-item Adjective Rating Scale is as good as the 10-item System Usability Scale and the Pictorial Single-Item Usability Scale is as good as the Pictorial System Usability Scale at reflecting differences in usability between systems.

Keywords:

• System Usability Scale
• Adjective Rating Scale
• Pictorial System Usability Scale
• Pictorial Single-Item Usability Scale
• perceived usability

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data of both experiments as well as screenshots of the online mobile phone contract purchasing systems are available at the project page of the Open Science Framework under https://osf.io/y5drh/

Additional information

Funding

The authors reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.