From the Publisher:
Written by the author of the best-selling HyperText & HyperMedia, this book provides an excellent guide to the methods of usability engineering. Special features: emphasizes cost-effective methods that will help developers improve their user interfaces immediately, shows you how to avoid the four most frequently listed reasons for delay in software projects, provides step-by-step information about which methods to use at various stages during the development life cycle, and offers information on the unique issues relating to informational usability. You do not need to have previous knowledge of usability to implement the methods provided, yet all of the latest research is covered.

Usability Engineering

The measurement of meaning

A slacks-based measure of super-efficiency in data envelopment analysis

Branding has emerged as a top management priority in the last decade due to the growing realization that brands are one of the most valuable intangible assets that firms have. Driven in part by this intense industry interest, academic researchers have explored a number of different brand-related topics in recent years, generating scores of papers, articles, research reports, and books. This paper identifies some of the influential work in the branding area, highlighting what has been learned from an academic perspective on important topics such as brand positioning, brand integration, brand-equity measurement, brand growth, and brand management. The paper also outlines some gaps that exist in the research of branding and brand equity and formulates a series of related research questions. Choice modeling implications of the branding concept and the challenges of incorporating main and interaction effects of branding as well as the impact of competition are discussed.

/pdf/brands-and-branding-research-findings-and-future-priorities-2n1yuyrxc1.pdf

Brands and Branding: Research Findings and Future Priorities

In most models of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), the best performers have the full efficient status denoted by unity (or 100%), and, from experience, we know that usually plural Decision Making Units (DMUs) have this “efficient status”. To discriminate between these efficient DMUs is an interesting subject. This paper addresses this “super-efficiency” issue by using the slacks-based measure (SBM) of efficiency, which the author proposed in his previous paper [European Journal of Operational Research 130 (2001) 498]. The method differs from the traditional one based on the radial measure, e.g. Andersen and Petersen model, in that the former deals directly with slacks in inputs/outputs, while the latter does not take account of the existence of slacks. We will demonstrate the rationality of our approach by comparing it with the radial measure of super-efficiency. The proposed method will be particularly useful when the number of DMUs are small compared with the number of criteria employed for evaluation.

A Slacks-based Measure of Super-Efficiency in Data Envelopment Analysis

In this paper we examine a neglected aspect of Data Envelopment Analysis: cross-efficiency. We develop the concept of cross-efficiency in a number of new directions. We ground an intuitive understanding of cross-efficiency in the concept of peer-appraisal, as opposed to self-appraisal implied by simple efficiency, and discuss the relative merits of each. We also present mathematical formulations of, and intuitive meanings for three possible implementations of aggressive and benevolent cross-efficiency. We have implemented two of these formulations in computer programs; their performance is compared empirically on a real data set. Finally, we suggest practical uses for cross-efficiency, illustrated with reference to the same data set.

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1057%2Fjors.1994.84.pdf

Efficiency and cross-efficiency in DEA: derivations, meanings and uses

Preference voting and project ranking using DEA and cross-evaluation

This article explores the role that color can play in building brand meaning with two experiments. Without prior conditioning, we demonstrate how an appropriately chosen color for a brand name (logo) can bring inherent and immediate value to a brand. Experiment 1 explores the notion of congruity, showing that it is more appropriate for functional products to be presented in functional colors, and sensorysocial products in sensory-social colors. Experiment 2 examines the effect of red and blue on brands of products that can be classified as both functional and sensory-social, and the ability of color to enhance a brand's desired image. When people know how brands are attempting to position themselves, people consider colors congruent with those positions to be more appropriate.

The interactive effects of colors and products on perceptions of brand logo appropriateness

Given a choice set of two alternatives, the addition of a third alternative that is clearly inferior to one of the existing alternatives (but not the other), can result in a shift of preference to the alternative that dominates the new alternative. The basic asymmetrically dominated effect, as it is called, is first demonstrated under two different buying frames of mind (“What would you buy?” and “What would most people buy?”). It is then shown that the third alternative may be recognized as an unavailable option, yet still cause a preference shift. Finally, the asymmetrically dominated effect is demonstrated for real, in-store purchases. It is concluded that the effect is robust, has a wide scope, is quite sizeable, and is of practical significance. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

John R. Doyle

Papers

Efficiency and cross-efficiency in DEA: derivations, meanings and uses

Preference voting and project ranking using DEA and cross-evaluation

The interactive effects of colors and products on perceptions of brand logo appropriateness

The robustness of the asymmetrically dominated effect: Buying frames, phantom alternatives, and in‐store purchases

The formation of attitudes towards brand extensions: Testing and generalising Aaker and Keller's model