The Impact of Causal Attributions on the User Experience of Error Messages
Attribution theory deals with the causal explanations that individuals find for events and behaviors and the extent of control they feel to have to influence the cause. A person’s understanding of the causes of past events influences his/her future action
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Abstract Attribution theory deals with the causal explanations that individuals find for events and behaviors and the extent of control they feel to have to influence the cause. A person’s understanding of the causes of past events influences his/her future actions, e.g. the motivation to carry on with a task. This study examines whether causal attributions of computer users have an influence on the perception and the experience of system and error messages by means of an online survey with N = 196 participants. The study results give hints that the attribution of computer-related failures indeed partly influences how users perceive systems and error messages.
Keywords Attribution research System and error messages User experience Computer-related attitudes Computer mastery Computer failure User types
1 Introduction The interaction between humans and computers does not always run smoothly and without any challenges. Misunderstandings, problems or errors may occur that prevent the user from completing a task. About these events, the user is usually informed by a system or error message. In theory error messages should convey what went wrong, what corrective action can be taken, and what is the cause of the error or point as accurately as possible to the type of error [1, 2].
A. Niels (&) T. Lesser T. Krüger Luebeck University of Applied Sciences, Mönkhofer Weg 239, 23562 Luebeck, Germany e-mail: [email protected] T. Lesser e-mail: [email protected] T. Krüger e-mail: [email protected] © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2017 T.Z. Ahram and W. Karwowski (eds.), Advances in The Human Side of Service Engineering, Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing 494, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-41947-3_17
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However, the reality is different in many cases: Error messages are rarely helpful, often formulated in an incomprehensible way, and frequently contain insufficient information for troubleshooting and problem resolution [3]. For the users error messages are often disruptive because they are distracted from their original task. These interruptions can lead to frustration and irritation or even abandonment of the task [3, 4]. Cooper describes how computer users perceive error messages: A negative system feedback about the failure of an action is simultaneously perceived as apportionment of blame. The user feels ashamed when the software notifies that (s)he made a mistake [5]. Therefore, error messages can have a major impact on emotions, motivation and the behavior of computer users. But does this apply to all users equally? Do all users principally attribute the cause of a negative system feedback to themselves? Attribution Theory deals with this issue, the question of ‘Why?’ or ‘What is the cause?’. Attribution Theory is based on the human need of finding causes for events and describes the levels (Attributional Dimensions) at which causal attributions take place [6]. Heider [6] differentiated causes with respect to the dimensions o
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