No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
Emotion Task Analysis: Proposing a Tool for the Assessment of Emotional Components in a Task
Abstract
Emotion is critical to human experience and is an integral part of perception, cognition, and behavior. While the mechanisms and precise measurement of emotion has been debated in the literature, researchers have theorized that emotion is related to activation across physiological, experiential, and behavioral response systems. This has important implications in human factors research and practice. Just as the cognitive task analysis was proposed to be used in tandem with hierarchical task analyses to account for cognitive components of a task, the current paper proposes a method to account for emotional components of a task. The emotion task analysis is proposed for the purpose of explicating emotion from an individual. Specifically, in order to account for emotional load and/or processes elicited during a task and to be used in tandem with previously established task analyses by usability/user experience researchers and human factors practitioners.
... It is worth noting that a cognitive task analysis can effectively describe a mentally challenging task, but it may not explain it. Simply describing the task may overlook the underlying mechanisms that could lead to increased mental workload and decreased performance [8]. ...
... As a result, designers are recognizing the importance of integrating emotional elements into interface design. This approach allows for a more relatable and captivating user experience [8]. ...
... Emotions are now recognized as a vital component of the user experience, aiming to transition from purely functional and usable software to systems that hold inherent value for the user's emotional well-being. Furthermore, the arrangement of emotional task analysis is a systematic approach that aims to comprehend the elements of an emotion-related task as shown in Figure 4 [8]. It entails dissecting the task into its constituent elements, dissecting those elements, and combining the findings to create a thorough grasp of the task. ...
Task analysis is an integral part of human-computer interaction, as it permits the client to comprehend, complete, and benefit from the utilization of an interaction system. Task analysis methodologies differ based on the selected approach and the motivation behind its use. The present study aims to compare several task analysis methodologies (i.e. hierarchical task analysis, cognitive task analysis, GOMS task analysis, and emotion task analysis), initially outlining their commonalities and distinctions in structure and usability. After that, it will go into each technique's benefits and drawbacks and how well-suited it is for different jobs. The main results that have been obtained by this research are: the HTA technique is an appropriate selection when the analysis seeks to explore the connections and interdependencies among different components of the task, whereas CTA is appropriate for the analysis that necessitates a technique with an undefined structure comprising of interviews. If the analysis system seeks to identify a cognitive process with a clearly defined structure, the GOMs technique can be a superb option. Lastly, when the task analysis aims to comprehend the emotional aspects of task performance, the ETA serves as an effective instrument to employ. In terms of usability, HTA is widely utilized in the fields of task assistance design and error prediction. CTA proves to be beneficial for tasks that demand sophisticated cognitive functions, GOMS is typically employed in the creation of training tools, the design of assist frameworks, and the documentation for clients, and ETA examines how users' psychological or emotional states influence their responses to tasks as they complete them. It is advised that readers go over this comparison paper in order to obtain a better knowledge of how to select the precise strategy that can aid in finishing an assignment.
Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA) is a powerful methodological approach that can enhance the rigorous elicitation and documentation of complex cognitive processes within interview-based qualitative research. We provide insights into this set of semi-structured interviewing techniques that we contend have much to offer management researchers who wish to understand the complexities of expert cognition within specific work-related tasks. Distinct from traditional semi-structured interview methods, CTA is designed to identify the knowledge requirements underpinning expertise in complex work domains. First, we present CTA as a robust approach to eliciting complex cognition and note why, when, and where management scholars might best use its techniques. Second, we provide two examples of how CTA methods have been used to research management; specifically, using the Critical Decision Method to explore management in high-stakes environments, and Applied Cognitive Task Analysis to explore global leadership. In ending, we propose greater use of this pragmatic approach in management research and highlight potential avenues for future research that will advance understanding of complex cognition at work.
As research interests have been increased on emotions and affect in Human Factors and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), extensive research has been conducted on developing emotion detection technologies. However, little research has been conducted on the necessary former steps–for example, identifying what emotions are involved in specific use cases and how those emotions need to be treated. The present paper introduces a novel affective design tool, “Task Emotion Analysis (TEA)” following the traditional Human Factors method, Task Analysis. TEA involves basic task analysis but provides (1) what types of emotions are induced from or engaged with each task, (2) why they are induced, and (3) how they can be mitigated through interactions with technologies. Sample TEA results are provided to demonstrate its effectiveness. We hope that TEA can provide a legitimate method for the design of empathic interfaces and contribute to conducting deeper emotion analysis in Human Factors and HCI research.
In this practice-oriented paper, we describe Multidimensional Task Analysis (MTA). MTA encourages researchers, designers, and evaluators to perform a range of focused task analyses when working with, or toward, a product, process, or system. While some forms of task analysis are well known - e.g., behavioral and cognitive task analysis -MTA suggests that there are many other task analyses that could be performed. Each additional analysis helps the practitioner identify important design constraints and opportunities. As a case-study, we discuss one form of analysis in depth: Emotional Task Analysis (ETA). ETA allows and encourages practitioners to make explicit emotional aspects of a task. We briefly present other new forms of task analysis, including Information Task Analysis, Decision Task Analysis, Attention Task Analysis, and Teamwork Task Analysis. We also suggest a wide range of other forms of task analysis.
The relationship of emotional intelligence (EI) with job performance was investigated in 188 individuals working as expatriates. Job performance was considered in terms of task and contextual performance - helping (OCB-H) and voice (OCB-V) organizational citizenship behaviours - and was assessed by line managers. In line with expectations, most identified relationships were of quadratic U-shaped form. Specifically, all three relationships of the global EI construct, and eight out of the 11 identified relationships of its four facets, were of U-shape. That included the relationships of all four EI facets with task performance, and the relationships of two dimensions, self-emotional appraisal (SEA) and regulation of emotion (ROE) with OCB-H and with OCB-V. The findings illustrate the link of global EI and its facets with contextual performance apart from task performance that has been the primary focus of research thus far. The findings also suggest that although those with the highest scores on EI receive the strongest job performance ratings those who are most disadvantaged in terms of job performance are not the lowest EI scorers but rather those who find themselves near the middle of the EI scores continuum.
Although there has been steady progress elucidating the influence of emotion on cognition, it remains unclear precisely when and why emotion impairs or facilitates cognition. The present study investigated the mechanisms involved in the influence of emotion on perception and working memory (WM), using modified 0-back and 2-back tasks, respectively. First, results showed that attentional focus modulated the impact of emotion on perception. Specifically, emotion facilitated perceptual task performance when it was relevant to the task, but it impaired performance when it was irrelevant to the task. The differential behavioural effect of emotion on perception as a function of attentional focus diminished under high WM load. Second, attentional focus did not directly modulate the impact of emotion on WM, but rather its influence depended on the dynamic relationship between internal representations. Specifically, WM performance was worse when the material already being held online and the new input were of matching emotions (e.g. both were negative), compared to when they were not. We propose that the competition between “bottom-up” and “top-down” processing for limited cognitive resources explains the nature of the influence of emotion on both perception and WM.
This article focuses on Bob Zajonc’s views on unconscious emotion, especially in the context of the debates about the independence of affect and cognition. Historically, Bob was always interested in the “mere”—basic, fundamental processes. His empirical demonstrations of precognitive and preconscious emotional processes, combined with his elegant expositions of them, sharply contrasted with cold and complex cognitive models. Interestingly, Bob tended to believe that whereas the causes of emotion can be unconscious, the emotional state itself tends to be conscious. However, he reconsidered this assumption and in his later work showed that subjects in affective priming experiments do not experience conscious affect, but instead act on basic preferences. Today, Bob’s insights continue to inspire research on “unconscious emotion.”
Product design that provides aesthetic appeal, pleasure and satisfaction can greatly influence the success of a product. Traditional cognitive approaches to product usability have tended to underestimate or fragment emotion from an understanding of the user experience. Affect, which is inexplicable linked to attitudes, expectations and motivations, plays a significant role in the cognition of product interaction, and therefore can be usefully treated as a design aid. Emotion influences and mediates specific aspects of interaction before, during and after the use of a product. These affective states regularly impact how a user manipulates and explores a user interface in order to support a desired cognitive state. To better understand the specific qualities of user experience impacting desirability and pleasureability, it is necessary to understand how artifacts trigger and mediate affect and how these processes aid user cognition during interaction. The implications for design are that emotion acts as a critical component of artifact sense- making and determines how artifacts are interpreted (Rafaeli and Vilnai-Yavetz, 2003). Designers that understand how cognitive artifacts interchange with affective artifacts will be better able to support actual product use and perceived pleasure.
These words illustrate that our relationship with the physical world is an emotional one. Clearly, the ‘fun of use,’ i.e. the fun one experiences from owning or using a product, also belongs to the affective rather than rational domain. The difficulty in studying affective concepts as ‘enjoyment of use’ and ‘fun of use’ is that they seem to be as intangible as they are appealing. Even more, rather than being an emotion as such, ‘having fun’ is probably the outcome of a wide range of possible emotional responses. Imagine, for example, the fun one has when watching a movie. This person will experience all kinds of emotions, such as fear, amusement, anger, relief, disappointment, and hope. Instead of one isolated emotion, it is the combination of these emotions that contributes to the experience of fun. It is not implausible that the same applies to other instances of fun, whether it is sharing a joke, using a product, or interacting with a computer. So far, little is known about how people respond emotionally to products and what aspects of design or interaction trigger emotional responses. In order to support the study of these responses, a measurement instrument was developed that is capable to measure combinations of simultaneously experienced emotions: the Product Emotion Measurement Instrument (PrEmo). This chapter discusses the development of PrEmo in the context of existing instruments. In addition, an illustrative cross-culture study is reported, in which emotions evoked by car models have been measured in Japan and in The Netherlands.
Emotional appeal is a key dimension in user experie nce that often goes unmeasured in most user-centered design projects. This paper presents preliminary work for developing a set of guidelines for efficiently, easily and cost-effecti vely assessing the users' affective state by evaluating their expr essive reactions during an interface evaluation process. The evaluat ion of this dimension complements the analysis of the objective and quantitative data gathered through usability tests and the subjective feedback provided through post-test ques tionnaires.
Results from a series of web site studies suggest that the concept of user satisfaction comprises more than perceived aesthetics and usability. Satisfaction was repeatedly found to be a complex construct comprising ‘emotion’, ‘likeability’, and ‘expectation’ as well. A web site very high in appeal but low in usability scored highly on user satisfaction when first encountered. However, when faced with serious problems in a usability test, users’ overall level of satisfaction dropped considerably, but perceived aesthetics remained unchanged. Given the known importance of the first impression for subsequent judgments, our results suggest that user interface designers of e-commerce sites would be well advised to design pretty and usable sites. Designing for user efficiency and effectiveness alone is not enough unless the products and services offered on a web site are unique in the world.
In this article, we propose and test within-person hypotheses about real-time correlates of momentary performance and emotions while working. Experience sampling methodology was used to prompt repeated reports of momentary task cognitions and emotions. Hypotheses were largely supported, with task difficulty, skill, interest, and effort predicting momentary perceived performance within person. Task interest had an effect on performance beyond that due to its contribution to effort. Skill, interest, effort, and performance predicted concurrent emotions. The effect of effort on positive emotions was fully mediated through performance, whereas interest had an effect on emotions beyond performance. The effects of skill and effort on emotions changed sign when performance was controlled, suggesting that it is unpleasant to be skilled or exert effort when performance does not improve commensurately. Perceived performance accounts for unique variance in emotions beyond that due to other predictors. Further within-person research on real-time motivation, performance, and emotions is encouraged.
The psychometric properties of the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (CERQ) as well as its prospective relationships with symptoms of depression and anxiety were studied in an adult general population sample. The results showed that the CERQ had good factorial validity and high reliabilities, with Cronbach's αs ranging between .75 and .87. In addition, the cognitive emotion regulation strategies accounted for considerable amounts of variance in emotional problems and strong relationships were found between the cognitive strategies self-blame, rumination, catastrophizing and positive reappraisal (inversely) and symptoms of depression and anxiety, both at first measurement and at follow-up. The CERQ might therefore be considered a valuable and reliable tool in the study of individual risk and protective factors associated with emotional problems, while providing us with important targets for intervention.
The study of emotions in organizational settings has attained considerable prominence in recent years, but I critical issue remains unresolved. This is the relationship between emotion and performance. in this special issue, 5 articles address this topic from a variety of viewpoints. Two are theoretical essays that deal, respectively, with emotion and creativity and the relationships between individual and team performance. Three are empirical studies that canvass the emotion-performance nexus across levels of analysis: within person, between persons, and in groups. Between them, the 5 articles present a strong case for the nexus of emotions and performance, but, more important, they provide a platform for potentially fruitful future research in this burgeoning area.
Many studies of ballpoint pens have been conducted. However, those studies have not considered the emotional factors that can enhance user experience. Styluses resemble ballpoint pens in many ways, which are widely available in a variety of styles. Therefore, in the present study, we explored the physical and emotional attributes that improve user satisfaction with typical ballpoint pens, with the goal of also understanding what factors might be important for stylus design. First, 14 emotional factors associated with the pens were derived. Second, 16 different types of ball-point pens were measured for six physical properties. Then, an experiment was performed to assess user satisfaction and emotional factors for pens. The House of Quality (HOQ) was used to obtain the chief physical properties. Results showed that to increase user satisfaction it is necessary to make pens be comfortable, fine, refined, deep, and natural. Also, we found that for high user satisfaction pens need to be heavier and longer, have thick and antislip grips and thin nibs, and their center of gravity should be located close to the nib to increase user satisfaction.
Part 1: the task analysis process. Part 2: task analysis techniques task data collection task description methods task simulation methods task behaviour assessment methods task requirements evaluation methods. Part 3: task analysis case studies balancing automation and human action through task analysis a preliminary communications system assessment a plant local panel review a staffing assessment for a local control room task simulation to predict operator workload in a command systenm task analysis of operator safety actions maintenance training a method for quantifying ultrasonic inspection effectiveness operational safety review of a solid waste storage plant a task analysis programme for a large nuclear chemical plant.
To examine the previously suggested, but unexamined, relation between emotions and task performance, we propose that individuals differ in their capacity to use fast emotional regulation processes (FERPs), which we define as processes that begin less than 350 msec after being exposed to an emotion evoking stimulus. Results of three laboratory studies show that individual differences in FERPs, but not slow emotional regulation processes (SERPs), predict emotional regulation performance. Results of Study 1 showed that FERPs significantly predicted editing task performance, task satisfaction, and depression after controlling for trait affectivity; whereas SERPs did not show any significant predictions. Study 2 replicated and extended the results of Study 1, and successfully addressed internal validity concerns related to SERPs. In Study 3, FERPs were shown to predict both performance measures when verbal ability and Conscientiousness were controlled. The combined results of these three studies suggest that FERPs may play a critical role in predicting task performance.
In an earlier study, Roger and Nesshoever (Person. individ. Diff.8, 527–534, 1987) reported the construction and validation of a scale for measuring emotion control entitled the Emotion Control Questionnaire (ECQ). Factor analysis revealed a 4-factor structure comprising Rehearsal, Emotional Inhibition, Aggression Control and Benign Control, which was replicated on an independent sample of subjects. The earlier study also presented the relationships between the ECQ factors and a variety of other personality scales. Subsequent work has shown that one of the ECQ factors in particular (Rehearsal) is significantly related to both heart-rate recovery and urinary cortisol elevations following stress. However, one of the disadvantages of the ECQ was the brevity of the factors, two of which (Emotional Inhibition and Benign Control) comprised just nine items each, and the present study was aimed at extending the range of behaviour sampled by the scale. Factor analyses of an expanded item pool confirmed the structure of the earlier scale and resulted in a new scale comprising 56 items, fourteen in each of the four factors. Other findings for the new scale (ECQ2) indicate that it is psychometrically equivalent to the original, and further data on the concurrent validation of the emotion control construct are presented.
Prior research on human ability to write database queries has concentrated on the characteristics of query interfaces and the complexity of the query tasks. This paper reports the results of a laboratory experiment that investigated the relationship between task complexity and time availability, a characteristic of the task context not investigated in earlier database research, while controlling the query interface, data model, technology, and training. Contrary to expectations, when performance measures were adjusted by the time used to perform the task, time availability did not have any effects on task performance while task complexity had a strong influence on performance at all time availability levels. Finally, task complexity was found to be the main determinant of user confidence. The implications of these results for future research and practice are discussed.
Emotional human–computer interactions are attracting increasing interest with the improvement in the available technology. Through presenting affective stimuli and empathic communication, computer agents are able to adjust to users' emotional states. As a result, users may produce better task performance. Existing studies have mainly focused on the effect of only a few basic emotions, such as happiness and frustration, on human performance. Furthermore, most research explored this issue from the psychological perspective. This paper presents an emotion and performance relation model in the context of vehicle driving. This general emotion–performance model is constructed on an arousal–valence plane and is not limited to basic emotions. Fifteen paid participants took part in two driving simulation experiments that induced 115 pairs of emotion–performance sample. These samples revealed the following: (1) driving performance has a downward U-shaped relationship with both intensities of arousal and valence. It deteriorates at extreme arousal and valence. (2) Optimal driving performance, corresponding to the appropriate emotional state, matches the “sweet spot” phenomenon of the engagement psychology. (3) Arousal and valence are not perfectly independent across the entire 2-D emotion plane. Extreme valence is likely to stimulate a high level of arousal, which, in turn, deteriorates task performance. The emotion–performance relation model proposed in the paper is useful in designing emotion-aware intelligent systems to predict and prevent task performance degradation at an early stage and throughout the human–computer interactions.
Psychological states such as thoughts and feelings are real. Brain states are real. The problem is that the two are not real in the same way, creating the mind-brain correspondence problem. In this article, I present a possible solution to this problem that involves two suggestions. First, complex psychological states such as emotion and cognition an be thought of as constructed events that can be causally reduced to a set of more basic, psychologically primitive ingredients that are more clearly respected by the brain. Second, complex psychological categories like emotion and cognition are the phenomena that require explanation in psychology, and, therefore, they cannot be abandoned by science. Describing the content and structure of these categories is a necessary and valuable scientific activity.Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world.-Einstein & Infeld (1938, p. 33)The cardinal passions of our life, anger, love, fear, hate, hope, and the most comprehensive divisions of our intellectual activity, to remember, expect, think, know, dream (and he goes on to say, feel) are the only facts of a subjective order…-James (1890, p. 195).
Research and developments in task analysis
- J Annett
- N Stanton
Annett, J. & Stanton, N. (2000). Research and developments
in task analysis. In J. Annett & N. Stanton (Eds.), Task
analysis (pp. 1-8). CRC Press.
A guide to task analysis: The task analysis working group
- L Kirwain
- K Ainsworth
Kirwain, L. & Ainsworth, K. (1992). A guide to task analysis:
The task analysis working group. CRC Press.
Nielsen Norman group: World leaders in research-based user experience
- J Nielson
- D Norman
Nielson, J., Norman, D., (2020). Nielsen Norman group:
World leaders in research-based user experience.
https://nngroup.com
The handbook of work analysis: The methods, systems, applications, & science of work measurement in organizations
- D J Gillan
Gillan, D. J. (2012). Five questions concerning task analysis. In M. A.
Wilson, R. J. Harvey, G. Alliger & W. Bennett Jr. (Eds.), The
handbook of work analysis: The methods, systems, applications, &
science of work measurement in organizations (pp. 201 -213).
New York: Routledge.