Culture and Website: User experience in website redesign based on cultural differences
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Typ
Examensarbete för masterexamen
Program
Publicerad
2019
Författare
Yang, Zihua
Modellbyggare
Tidskriftstitel
ISSN
Volymtitel
Utgivare
Sammanfattning
The growth of multinational corporations has lead to the increased importance of
cross-cultural communication across the globe. Therefore, the effect of cultural differences
on user requirements has become an essential issue. Hofstede’s six dimensions
and Hall’s concept of high and low context cultures have been widely discussed
and accepted, in relation to marketing and consumption. However, both theories
were conceived in the 1970s and may not apply to today’s environment. The investigations
for this thesis sought to discover and identify how cultural factors influence
user’s preferences for user experience attributes on websites, combining Hofstede’s
and Hall’s theories with Holliday’s grammar of culture and Edwin Hoffman’s Culture
mode theories. Design attributes such as color and layout were determined using
online surveys, usability tests and interviews with middle-class subjects from both
Sweden and China. A redesigned website and a guideline for cultural localization in
both countries are provided. The results confirm and extend prior research, as significant
differences were found in some of the listed design attributes, but tend to be
similar in some other attributes. Different user experience design is still suggested
for successful communication in different cultural groups. Although this study was
applied to cultural differences between China and Sweden, the methodology and
design procedure can be adapted for other cultures.
Beskrivning
Ämne/nyckelord
Cross-cultural design , User experience design , Web design , Usability , Communication , China , Sweden