Human-centered humanities: Using stimulus material for requirements elicitation in the design process of a digital archive

This pilot study proposes the use of so-called stimulus material during interviews for requirements elicitation as part of the design process of a digital archive. Designing complex systems like digital archives is not straightforward as users of these systems have specific needs and tasks that designers need to be aware of before the implementation phase can begin. Stimulus material can support the requirements elicitation to collect domain- and content-specific user tasks and needs, which might get overlooked otherwise. We supplemented semi-structured interviews with observational sessions in which print-outs of historical pamphlets and office supplies were handed to participants to give them the opportunity for in-depth study of the material. We found that the use of stimulus material helps participants to focus on the task at hand and articulate their actions and workflow steps more easily. Via thematic analysis the participants statements were turned into a coding schema that serves as requirements specification for an initial prototype.