Developing a Web Site Usability Scale: The validity and reliability analysis & implementation results

Abstract

The aim of this research was to develop a "User perception based web site usability scale" to be used for assigning usability of web sites based on user perception. After a literature review dimensions of usability were found out. Subsequently a pool of items including a total of 53 items was collected in this context. The draft form which was developed according to 7 subject matter experts' opinions, was applied on 245 students who had been using Gazi University Distance Education Vocational College LMS (Learning Management System) web site.  Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis methods were used to determine construct validity. For reliability, Cronbach alpha internal consistency coefficient was taken into account; corrected item-total correlation and t-test were used to examine significance between item averages of top %27 and bottom %27 groups. As a result of the analysis process, the user perception based web site usability scale, with a construct of four factors including of 25 items, was developed. Finally, the scale was applied on 239 e-learners in order to determine the usability level of the LMS web site which they had been using and results were reported.