The Best Design is Born from a Deep Empathy with the User! Revamping the Learning Mall UI through Eye-tracking, Participatory and Value-sensitive Design Methodologies

Learning Management Systems serve as vital tools for promoting quality teaching, learning, and assessments. However, these platforms often suffer from usability issues due to the neglect of learners' visual behavior in their design and implementation. Consequently, most of these applications appear as poorly designed and populated by disorganized content— eventually provoking tedious navigations and interactions at the learner’s end. Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University uses Learning Mall to organize coursework, assessment and facilitate staff-student interactions. However, there is lack of evidence whether any usability study, vis-à-vis learners’ gaze behavior and visual attention, on the Learning Mall has ever been carried out. To address the knowledge gap, this paper reports on a usability study, linked with Eye-tracking, Participatory and Value Sensitive Design approaches, in order to bring learner-centered improvements to the Learning Mall interface. Findings from Phase I unraveled several usability issues that affected learners’ experience with the Learning Mall, guiding the redesign efforts in Phase II through Participatory Design Workshops, to create hi-fidelity prototypes aligned with learners’ need and satisfaction.