[Apologies for any cross-posting]



Special Issue of International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction:

HCI Studies in Management Information Systems

Vol. 19, No. 1, 2005



AIS SIGHCI (http://sigs.aisnet.org/sighci/) sponsored and fast-tracked 

expansions of best completed research papers from HCI track at AMCIS 2004 

to this special issue of International Journal of Human-Computer 

Interaction (IJHCI). Papers that successfully underwent the 2-3 rounds of 

review process were published in this special issue.



Guest Editors:

Fiona Fui-Hoon Nah, University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Ping Zhang, Syracuse University

Scott McCoy, College of William and Mary 



Papers in the Special Issue:



1. Visualizing E-Brand Personality: Exploratory Studies on Visual 

Attributes and E-Brand Personalities in Korea (pp. 7-34)

Su-e Park, Dongsung Choi, and Jinwoo Kim 



The brand personality of an online product and service, usually 

represented by a web site, is known as its e-brand personality. In the 

competitive conditions of online markets, e-brand personality is agreed to 

be an important factor in securing distinctive identity; however, few 

studies have suggested how to establish e-brand personality through the 

visual design of web sites. This study explores the feasibility of 

constructing target e-brand personalities for online services by using 

visual attributes. It consists of three consecutive studies. The first 

study identified four major dimensions of e-brand personality on diverse 

web sites. The second study used 52 experimental home pages to identify 

key visual attributes associated with those four personality dimensions. 

The third study explored whether those findings from the second study can 

be applied in constructing websites for online services. The results show 

that two visual attributes, simplicity and cohesion, are closely related 

to a bold personality. Three attributes, contrast, density, and 

regularity, can be used to create a web site that has an analytical 

personality. Contrast, cohesion, density, and regularity are closely 

related to a web site that is perceived to have a friendly personality. 

Regularity and balance were expected to be related to the sophisticated 

personality dimension, but no such relation was identified in the third 

study. The article concludes with a discussion of implications, 

limitations, and future research directions. 



2. The Enhanced Restricted Focus Viewer (pp. 35-54)

Peter Tarasewich, Marc Pomplun, Stephanie Fillion, and Daniel Broberg 



The Enhanced Restricted Focus Viewer (ERFV) is a unique software tool for 

tracking the visual attention of users in hyperlinked environments such as 

Web sites. The software collects data such as mouse clicks along with the 

path of the user’s visual attention as they browse a site. Unlike 

traditional eye-tracking procedures, the ERFV requires no hardware to 

operate other than a personal computer. In addition to cost and time 

savings, the ERFV also allows the administration of usability testing to 

groups of subjects simultaneously. A laboratory test comparing the ERFV to 

a hardware-based eye-tracking system showed that the two methods compare 

favorably in terms of how well they track a user’s visual attention. The 

usefulness of the ERFV as a usability testing tool was demonstrated 

through an experiment that evaluated two Web sites that were equivalent in 

content but differed in terms of design. While several open issues 

concerning the ERFV still remain, some of these issues are being addressed 

through ongoing research efforts. 



3. Issues in Building Multi-User Interfaces (pp. 55-74)

V. Srinivasan Rao, Wai-Lan Luk, and John Warren 



The proliferation of interest in collaborative computer applications in 

the past decade has resulted in a corresponding increase in the interest 

in multi-user interfaces. The current research seeks to contribute to an 

understanding of the process of developing user models for group 

interaction, and to the design and implementation of multi-user interfaces 

based on the model. We use group ranking as an exemplar task. User 

requirements were identified, by observing groups perform the ranking task 

in a non-computer environment. A design was proposed based on the 

identified requirements and a prototype implemented. Feedback from 

informal user evaluation of the implemented interface is reported. 

Insights on the methodology are discussed. 



4. Online Consumer Trust and Live Help Interfaces: The Effects of 

Text-to-Speech Voice and 3D Avatars (pp. 75-94)

Lingyun Qiu and Izak Benbasat 



With the increasing prevalence of online shopping, many companies have 

begun to provide Live Help functions, through instant messaging or text 

chatting, on their websites to facilitate interactions between online 

consumers and customer service representatives (CSRs). The continuing 

reliance of these functions on text-based communication limits non-verbal 

communication with consumers and the social contexts for the information 

conveyed, but with the help of emerging multimedia technologies, companies 

can now use computer-generated voice and humanoid avatars to embody CSRs, 

thus enriching the interactive experiences of their customers. In this 

study, a laboratory experiment was conducted to empirically test the 

effects of Text-To-Speech (TTS) voice and 3D avatars on consumer trust 

towards CSRs. TTS voice was implemented to deliver answers aloud. A 3D 

avatar served as the humanoid representation of a CSR. The results 

demonstrate that the presence of TTS voice significantly increases 

consumers’ cognitive and emotional trust toward the CSR. These findings 

offer practitioners guidelines to improve the interface design of real 

time human-to-human communications for e-commerce websites. 



5. An Empirical Examination of the Effects of Web Personalization at 

Different Stages of Decision-Making (pp. 95-112)

Shuk Ying Ho and Kar Yan Tam 



Personalization agents are incorporated in many websites to tailor content 

and interfaces for individual users. But in contrast to the proliferation 

of personalized web services worldwide, empirical research on the effects 

of web personalization is scant. How does exposure to personalized offers 

affect subsequent product consideration and choice outcome? Drawing on 

literature in human computer interaction (HCI) and user behavior, this 

research examines the effect of three major elements of web 

personalization strategies on users’ information processing through 

different decision-making stages: personalized content quality, feature 

overlapping among alternatives, and personalized message framing. These 

elements can be manipulated by a firm in implementing its personalization 

strategy. A study using a personalized ring-tone download website was 

conducted. The findings provide empirical evidence of the effects of web 

personalization. In particular, when users are forming their consideration 

sets, the agents can play a role in helping users discover new products 

and/or generate demand for unfamiliar products. Once a decision has been 

made, however, the personalization agent’s persuasive effects diminish. 

Our results establish that the role of personalization agents changes at 

different stages of users’ decision-making process. 



6. Beyond Perceptions and Usage: Impact of Nature of IS Use on IS-enabled 

Productivity (pp. 113-136) 

Vikas Jain and Shivraj Kanungo 



Assessing individual performance impacts from information system (IS) use 

has been a key area of concern for IS researchers for many years. However, 

past studies have reported mixed results about the relationship between 

information system use and performance impacts at the individual level. 

The research reported in this paper has two primary objectives: (1) to 

propose a model of individual IS-enabled productivity that focuses not 

only on the usage of information systems but also the nature of this 

usage, and (2) to empirically test the model across two IS applications. 

The key premise in this research is that IS use is necessary but not 

sufficient to observe productivity gains and that nature of IS use 

potentially mediates the relationship between IS use and IS-enabled 

productivity. We validate our research model through a survey of 486 

individuals across six organizations. Results from this study confirm the 

proposition that the nature of IS use is as important as the duration of 

use of an information system as a determinant of IS-enabled productivity. 

Based on our findings, we provide theoretical and managerial implications 

of the relationship between IS-enabled productivity and IS use. 



7. Role of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) Factors as Moderators of 

Occupational Stress and Work Exhaustion (pp. 137-154)

K.S. Rajeswari and R. N. Anantharaman 



Software professionals perform boundary-spanning activities and hence need 

strong interpersonal, technical and organizational knowledge to be 

professionally competent. They have to perform in a demanding work 

environment that is characterized by strict deadlines, differing time 

zones, interdependency in teams, increased interaction with clients and 

extended work hours. These characteristics lead to occupational stress and 

work exhaustion. Yet, the impact of stress is felt in different ways by 

different people even if they perform the same functions. These 

differences in the perception of stress can be due to varying confidence 

in their technical capabilities. Individuals possess varying technical 

capabilities based on their acquisition of technical skills, comfort level 

in using the technology and intrinsic motivation. These attributes 

represent the HCI personality of software professionals. It is therefore 

the focus of this paper to examine, if these HCI factors moderate the 

relationship between occupational stress and work exhaustion. Data was 

collected from software professionals located in Chennai and Bangalore in 

India. Data revealed that HCI factors have main effect on work exhaustion, 

but does not have moderating effects on work exhaustion. Control over 

technology variable emerged as the key variable among the HCI factors that 

affects software professionals’ ability to cope with stress and work 

exhaustion.



-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fiona Fui-Hoon Nah, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Management Information Systems

University of Nebraska-Lincoln

209 College of Business Administration

Lincoln, NE 68588-0491

Tel: (402) 472-6060

Fax: (402) 472-5855

Email: [log in to unmask]

My Home Page: http://ait.unl.edu/fnah

AIS SIGHCI Home Page: http://sigs.aisnet.org/sighci