I thought that the universality of methods for research was a fundamental fact of modern science. Isn’t it obvious that having successfully applied quantitative/qualitative research in one domain means that your skills can be applied to any other domain with minimal adaptation time? Is there a real difference between applying qualitative research in a complex avatar-system like MGUIDE and an e-commerce web site? For example, If you apply techniques like unstructured interviews wouldn’t you follow the same principles to design the interviews in both domains?
Or even using more complex techniques like eye tracking and emotion recognition, aren’t these domain-independent? Consider for instance, my combined emotion recognition + face detection technique for accessibility research, described in the previous post. The technique was developed with avatar-based interfaces/presentation systems in mind. Adapting the technique to different domains is a matter of defining the aspects of the interface you wish to research. The quantitative data that you will collect are the same (emotion intensities, etc), the qualitative of course will differ because the interfaces are different. In general once you establish the objectives/goals of the research, deciding which techniques you will use (and modifying them if necessary to suit your needs) is easy and the process is domain-independent.
Eye tracking used in completely different contexts: a) a 3D avatar-based world and b) a web page.
I am not sure why some people insist otherwise and focus so much on the subject matter. I have to agree that having expertise in a certain area, means that you can produce results fairly quickly. However this is a process easily learnt. Is domain expertise the most important quality a user researcher should have? Or should he perhaps have a solid research skills-set to start from and the willingness to learn more about established techniques and explore new ones?
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