User measures of quality of experience: why being objective and quantitative is important

This article develops the concept of quality of user experience by focusing on requirements for its measurement and communication for use in industry. Whereas more typical work involves either modeling media quality based on technical measures or user subjective assessment of media quality, it is argued that QoE measurement should include objective measures of the process and outcomes of usage. Also, subjective measures should be collected as quantitative data rather than qualitative data as is currently common, because quantitative data enables combined analyses of objective and subjective measures for deriving global QoE ratings. Global ratings are important for optimizing the communicability of results to target audiences. Examples of measures and scales are provided. A structured approach to defining and measuring QoE in relation to QoS is explained and illustrated.