Comparing Mobile APPs Usability Characteristics for Designers and Users

Abstract

As the mobile device market grows, so grows the commercial market and therefore the subsequent development of applications for this medium. As this rush to develop apps continues to grow, the search continues for what characteristics will help mobile apps be adopted and continued to be used. This exploratory study looks to see if there are differences between how users of mobile applications and developers of mobile applications perceive these characteristics. The results of our study identified areas of statistically significant differences on key design characteristics between mobile application designers with mobile applications users. More interestingly, a detailed analysis found that there is likely disagreement in the consensus by the two groups concerning the characteristics' priority. The implications of this disagreement are an important factor for the development of new mobile applications.