Automated end-user behaviour assessment tool for remote product and system testing

This paper introduces a virtual reality (VR) based automated end-user behavioural assessment tool required during product and system development process. In the proposed method, while VR is used as a means of interactive system prototype; data collection and analysis are handled by an event based system which is adopted from human–computer interaction and data mining literature. The overall objective of the study is developing an intelligent support system where physical prototyping and the needs for human involvement as instructors, data collectors and analysts during the user assessment studies are eliminated. The proposed method is tested on a product design example using 27 subjects. The experimental results clearly demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed user assessment tool.