doi:10.1093/iwc/iwv031 The Heuristic Quality Scale

This paper presents the Heuristic Quality Scale (HQS), an instrument designed to assess the quality of a published heuristic set. The purpose of this instrument is 2-fold: first, to aid the evaluator in selecting between prospective specialized heuristic sets for a given evaluation; second, to suggest considerations and guidelines for the creation and publication of new heuristic sets. The HQS was developed over a series of studies evaluating and refining iterations of the instrument while also polling the user experience community at large to identify which factors truly predict the quality of a particular set of heuristics. The contribution of the HQS is that it is a low-cost heuristic evaluation (HE) to apply to heuristic sets themselves. It produces a reliable subjective measure of the quality of a heuristic set and helps the usability professional rank and compare competing options for conducting HEs. RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS • The following attributes were identified as the most important when determining confidence in a set of specialized heuristics: basis, validation, ease of learning, ease of use and the appropriateness of the set to potentially uncover problems relevant to an application domain or end-user group. • Two evaluations of the instrument resulted in refinements that were corroborated with a large-scal