Michael D. Byrne
ABSTRACT
In the United States, computer-based voting machines are rapidly replacing other older technologies. While there is potential for this to be a usability improvement, particularly in terms of accessibility, the only way it is possible to know if usability has improved is to have baseline data on the usability of traditional technologies. We report an experiment assessing the usability of punch cards, lever machines, and two forms of paper ballot. There were no differences in ballot completion time between the four methods, but there were substantial effects on error rate, with the paper ballots superior to the other methods as well as an interaction with age of voters. Subjective usability was assessed with the System Usability Scale and showed a slight advantage for bubble-style paper ballots. Overall, paper ballots were found to be particularly usable, which raises important technological and policy issues.
- Ansolabehere, S., & Stewart, C., III. (2005). Residual votes attributable to technology. Journal of Politics, 67(2), 365--389.Google Scholar
Cross Ref
- Bederson, B. B., Lee, B., Sherman, R. M., Herrnson, P. S., & Niemi, R. G. (2003). Electronic voting system usability issues. In Human Factors in Computing Systems: Proceedings of CHI 2003 (pp. 145--152). New York: ACM. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Brooke, J. (1996). SUS: A "quick and dirty" usability scale. In P. W. Jordan, B. Thomas, B. A. Weerdmeester & A. L. McClelland (Eds.), Usability Evaluation in Industry (pp. 189--194). London: Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar
- Chin, J. P., Diehl, V. A., & Norman, K. L. (1988). Development of an instrument measuring user satisfaction of the human-computer interface. In Proceedings of SIGCHI '88 (pp. 213--218). New York: ACM. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Conrad, F. G., Lewis, B., Peytcheva, E., Traugott, M., Hanmer, M. J., Herrnson, P. S., et al. (2006). The usability of electronic voting systems: Results from a laboratory study. Paper presented at the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, IL. April 2006.Google Scholar
- Everett, S. P., Byrne, M. D., & Greene, K. K. (2006). Measuring the usability of paper ballots: Efficiency, effectiveness, and satisfaction. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 50th Annual Meeting. Santa Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Frøkjaer, E., Hertzum, M., & Hornbaek, K. (2000). Measuring usability: Are effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction really correlated? In Human Factors in Computing Systems: Proceedings of CHI 2000 (pp. 345--352). New York: ACM. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Greene, K. K., Byrne, M. D., & Everett, S. P. (2006). A comparison of usability between voting methods. Proceedings of the 2006 USENIX/ACCURATE Electronic Voting Technology Workshop. Vancouver, BC, Canada. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Herrnson, P. S., Niemi, R. G., Hanmer, M. J., Bederson, B. B., Conrad, F. G., & Traugott, M. (2006). Voters'abilities to cast their votes as intended. Paper presented at the Workshop on the Usability and Security of Electronic Voting System.Google Scholar
- Industry Usability Reporting Project. (2001). Common industry format for usability test reports (ANSI/INCITS 354-2001).Google Scholar
- International Committee for Information Technology Standards. ISO 9241-11. (1998). Ergonomic requirements for office work with visual display terminals (VDT)s part 11. Guidance on usability.Google Scholar
- Kimball, D. C., & Kropf, M. (2005). Ballot design and unrecorded votes on paper-based ballots. Public Opinion Quarterly, 69(4), 508--529.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Kohno, T., Stubblefield, A., Rubin, A. D., & Wallach, D. S. (2004). Analysis of an electronic voting system. Paper presented at the 2004 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, Oakland, CA. May 2004.Google Scholar
- Laskowski, S. J., Autry, M., Cugini, J., Killam, W., & Yen, J. (2004). Improving the usability and accessibility of voting systems and products. NIST Special Publication 500--256.Google Scholar
- Mebane, W. R. (2004). The wrong man is president! Overvotes in the 2000 presidential election in Florida. Perspectives on Politics, 2(3), 525--535.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Roth, S. K. (1998). Disenfranchised by design: Voting systems and the election process. Information Design Journal, 9(1), 1--8.Google Scholar
- Sellen, A. J., & Harper, R. H. R. (2001). The myth of the paperless office. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Taebel, D. A. (1975). The effect of ballot position on electoral success. American Journal of Political Science, 19(3), 519--526.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Wand, J. N., Shotts, K. W., Sekhon, J. S., Mebane, W. R., Herron, M. C., & Brady, H. E. (2001). The butterfly did it: The aberrant vote for Buchanan in Palm Beach County, Florida. American Political Science Review, 95(4), 793--810.Google ScholarCross Ref
Index Terms
- Usability of voting systems: baseline data for paper, punch cards, and lever machines
Recommendations
Electronic voting machines versus traditional methods: improved preference, similar performance
CHI '08: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing SystemsIn the 2006 U.S. election, it was estimated that over 66 million people would be voting on direct recording electronic (DRE) systems in 34% of the nation's counties [8]. Although these computer-based voting systems have been widely adopted, they have ...
Straight-party voting: what do voters think?
Special issue on electronic votingOne of the options available to a sizable minority of U.S. voters is the ability to, with a single action, cast votes in multiple races; this is termed straight-party voting (SPV). SPV is implemented inconsistently across the U.S. and this may result in ...
An Experiment in Approval Voting
The first major experimental comparison of approval voting with regular plurality voting occurred in the 1985 annual election of The Institute of Management Sciences TIMS. In approval voting a person votes for approves of as many candidates as desired, ...
Comments