Attention to effects of different cross-cultural levels in user research method's interface: Discipline or nationality - Which has stronger force?

Abstract

In the recent years, design research have developed a long way in investigating about the users and their contexts. It was aimed to challenge the way 'cross-culture influence' has been considered in design research field: should there be better way than profiling users solely based on nationality in multinational research project for product specification. Major findings through this research included (1) Nationality factor influenced remarkably on user performance but not much on user attitude. In contrast, discipline factor influenced significantly on every elements of user participation. (2) The gaps of user attitude and performance with nationality as the function maintained same levels while the effects from discipline factor intensified upon the increase of task complexity and change of ask characteristic. Overall, Discipline factor dominated Nationality factor, insisting on the importance of considering different levels of participants' cultures in designing the interface of user experience research methods. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.