Title:	EXPLORING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ANXIETY AND USABILITY EVALUATION - AN ONLINE STUDY OF INTERNET AND WIKI ANXIETY
Author(s):	Benjamin R. Cowan , Lorenzo Vigentini , Mervyn A. Jack
ISBN:	978-972-8924-59-1
Editors:	Katherine Blashki
Year:	2008
Edition:	Single
Keywords:	Wiki anxiety, usability, Internet anxiety
Type:	Full Paper
First Page:	69
Last Page:	76
Language:	English
Cover:
Full Contents:	click to dowload
Paper Abstract:	Even though learning technology is becoming pervasive, there is evidence suggesting that many students feel anxious about using Information Technology resources such as computers and the Internet, with females generally being more anxious towards technology. Anxious people may still have to use IT as University courses promote the acquisition of transferable skills. The focus towards high IT usage may put anxious users at a disadvantage in education as traditional methods of knowledge dissemination are eroded. As anxiety affects the nature of interaction with a user interface, careful attention to usability design may hold the key to reducing this anxiety and allow students to comfortably interact with highly beneficial learning technology. As part of course requirements, 125 second year students in Psychology used a wiki system in support of the production of their final year group projects. A wiki allows users to add, edit and amend information, page design and navigational structure (via the use of in-text hyperlinks) through the use of wiki markup language or a simple text editor. This offered the opportunity to explore the relations between anxiety and usability of wikis using newly developed measures for this specific user interface. It was found that wiki anxiety, Internet anxiety and state anxiety scores were highly correlated providing validity to the anxieties being measured. Wiki anxiety had a strong negative relationship with usability evaluation of the wiki. Females were also found to be more Internet and wiki anxious and rated the wiki as less usable than males. Additionally higher anxiety was related with lower use of the wiki. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for usability evaluation, IT anxiety research and their implications on higher education drive to further utilize IT applications as learning aids. Limitations in the measure of self-reported usability are also discussed.
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