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Bastien & Scapin’s Evaluation of Human-Computer Interfaces

Ergonomic criteria system for user-interface evaluation.

Try Bastien & Scapin's heuristics

Dominique Bastien and Christian Scapin's Ergonomic Criteria for the Evaluation of Human-Computer Interfaces is one of the most rigorous heuristic systems ever published. Developed at INRIA in the early 1990s, the criteria are organized into eight families — guidance, workload, explicit control, adaptability, error management, consistency, significance of codes, and compatibility — each with finely-grained sub-criteria.

The level of detail means an evaluation using Bastien & Scapin produces unusually specific findings. Rather than "the form is hard to use," a review produces observations like "workload → brevity → information density: this form asks for three fields that could be inferred from the user's profile." That specificity is why the criteria have been widely adopted in ergonomic research and European industrial UX practice.

The cost is time: a thorough Bastien & Scapin evaluation takes longer than a Nielsen's 10 pass. Use it when you need a definitive, citeable usability audit — product certification, academic research, or a one-time baseline review of a complex interface. For weekly design reviews, start lighter.

1. Guidance

User Guidance refers to means available to advise, orient, inform, instruct, and guide users throughout interactions with a computer (messages, alarms, labels, etc.), including lexical aspects.

1.1. Prompting

Means to lead users toward specific actions (data entry, tasks). Refers to alternatives when multiple actions are possible. Concerns status information about system state/context and help facility accessibility.

1.2. Grouping/Distinction of Items

Visual organization of information items indicating relationships, class membership, or differences through topology (location) and graphical characteristics (format). Includes organization within classes.

1.2.1. Grouping/Distinction by Location

Relative positioning of items indicating class membership or differences between classes and within classes.

1.2.2. Grouping/Distinction by Format

Graphical features (format, color, etc.) indicating class membership, distinctions between classes, or among items within a class.

1.3. Immediate Feedback

System responses to user actions (simple entries or complex transactions). Responses must be fast with appropriate, consistent timing. Information must address the transaction and its result.

1.4. Legibility

Lexical characteristics affecting readability (brightness, contrast, font size, spacing, line length, etc.). Excludes feedback and error messages by definition.

2. Workload

Interface elements reducing users' perceptual or cognitive load and increasing dialogue efficiency.

2.1. Brevity

Perceptual and cognitive workload for individual inputs/outputs and action sets. Aims to limit reading, input workload, and action steps.

2.1.1. Concision

The system should almost disappear, be transparent, while used to allow users to focus on the activity and engagement.

2.1.2. Minimal Actions

Number of actions necessary to accomplish goals/tasks, limiting required steps.

2.2. Information Density

Users' workload (perceptual/cognitive) regarding whole information sets presented, rather than individual elements.

3. Explicit Control

System processing of explicit user actions and user control over that processing.

3.1. Explicit User Action

Relationship between computer processing and user actions must be explicit — processing only requested actions when requested.

3.2. User Control

Users maintain control of system processing (interrupt, cancel, pause, continue). Appropriate options for all possible user actions.

4. Adaptability

System capacity to behave contextually according to user needs and preferences.

4.1. Flexibility

Means for users to customize interface for working strategies, habits, and task requirements. Reflects number of ways to achieve goals.

4.2. User Experience

Means to account for user experience levels.

5. Error Management

Means to prevent/reduce errors and recover when they occur (invalid data, format errors, command syntax, etc.).

5.1. Error Protection

Detection and prevention of data entry, command, or destructive action errors.

5.2. Quality of Error Messages

Phrasing and content regarding relevance, readability, and specificity about error nature and correction actions.

5.3. Error Correction

Means available for users to correct their errors.

6. Consistency

Interface design choices (codes, naming, formats, procedures) maintained in similar contexts and differentiated in different contexts.

7. Significance of Codes

Relationship between terms/signs and references. Codes are significant when strong semantic relationships exist between codes and referenced items/actions.

8. Compatibility

Match between user characteristics (memory, perceptions, customs, skills, age, expectations) and task characteristics with system organization (output, input, dialogue). Includes coherence between environments and applications.

Other

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