Human Information Interaction

Background and Aim: The main objective of the research is to determine the understanding level of the students of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad in the terms used in user interface of SIMAD library software.

Methods: The study is an applied research with survey descriptive method. Research population was Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, including 24346 students of whom 164 were selected as sample. Data was collected through questionnaire and SPSS software was used as an instrument for the analysis of the data obtained.

Results: The results indicated that the user's level of understanding of terms used in the user interface is not desirable in objective method (23 words investigated). However, regarding subjective method (the items of the Likert scale) the level of understanding is acceptable. Furthermore, the grammar and the length of the phrases used in the user interface do not result in better understanding of the Terms. Finally, there is not a significant difference between students' understanding level of Terms and students' educational level and field of study in both objective and subjective methods.

Conclusion: To design an appropriate user interface for information retrieval systems, the needs and level of comprehension related to the users must be taken into consideration. However, in other to increase the users’ ability in making use of library software, educating the users appears to be of cardinal importance.