Usability of a touchscreen assessment tool (TATOO) prototype for clinicians and typically developing children

Abstract

Purpose

Touchscreen devices are widely used in modern life and have quickly become part of daily life for children, including during Occupational Therapy sessions for children with disabilities. Touchscreen Assessment Tool (TATOO) is a prototype application used to evaluate children’s performance when using touchscreen devices. The purpose of this study, based on the logical user-centred interaction design framework, was to evaluate TATOO’s usability for occupational therapists and typically developing children and to examine the correlations between their usability scores.

Methods

A convenience sample of clinicians (N = 10) and children with typical development (N = 60) was recruited for this study. The usability assessment was conducted using the System Usability Scale (SUS) and semi-structured interviews for the clinicians, and the Short Feedback Questionnaire-Child (SFQ-Child) for the children.

Results

The SUS scores (M ± SD = 85.5 ± 8.04, range = 70–97.5) indicated good ratings of TATOO’s usability by clinicians; the SFQ-Child results showed children also rated its usability very highly, including all ages (4–10 years) and all tasks. The clinicians all expressed positive attitudes towards using TATOO, and no bias was found between the clinicians’ usability scores and the children’s usability feedback.

Conclusion

The TATOO is a user-friendly tool. Researchers and clinicians can benefit from the availability of an objective and low-cost assessment tool to promote their evaluation and intervention by providing more focussed individualized recommendations and adaptations. The study also suggests a model to follow when developing applications and evaluating their usability through a mixed-method approach to deepen understanding of the user’s needs.

Implications for rehabilitation

• Touchscreen Assessment Tool (TATOO) shows a user-friendly tool for assessing the different skills required to operate touchscreens interface.

• TATOO has the potential to become an essential objective and low-cost assessment tool for the clinician, in which the spread of touchscreens constantly increases.

• Researchers and clinicians can benefit from the availability of such tools to promote their evaluation and intervention by providing more focussed individualized recommendations and adaptations.

• TATOO will complement the assessment needs, as traditional fine motor assessment tools cannot capture the skills necessary to operate a touchscreen device

• The study suggests a model to follow when developing applications and evaluating their usability through a mixed-method approach in order to deepen understanding of the user’s needs.

Keywords:

• Touchscreen assessment
• usability
• user-centred design
• outcome measures

Acknowledgments

The authors cordially thank the contribution of the following OTs who participated in data collection for their time, effort and willingness to share their experience in evaluating: Prof. Tamar Weiss; Sharon Weiss; Maya Hegeni; Lior Dolv; Gowana Hashem; Raaya Demti; Tom Adam, Odelia Samuel; Hana Dyan; Yafit Rafael and Rut Meman. The authors warmly thank Dr Sabato Mellone for his help in the technical part of TATOO development.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work has been supported by EDEN – Erasmus MunDus AcadEmic Network.