MFS Design in Appstore-enabled Smart Featurephones for Low-literate, Marginalized Communities

Title of the Paper

MFS Design in Appstore-enabled Smart Featurephones for Low-literate, Marginalized Communities

Paper Information

• Subject Areas: Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICTD), Financial Technology (FinTech)
• Keywords: Financial services, user experience design, low-literate users, human-computer interaction, mobile devices, low-cost phones, social inclusion, design guidelines

Research Background and Problem Statement

• Identified Problems or Challenges:

  • Users from marginalized, low-literate communities face numerous challenges when using mobile financial services (MFS), such as cultural barriers, limited technological literacy, and difficulties navigating complex interfaces.
  • MFS interface designs often neglect the needs of low-literate users, leading to their reliance on cash transactions and low trust in MFS.
  • Traditional featurephones are constrained by hardware limitations, and much research focuses on smartphones, leaving a gap in addressing the needs of featurephone users on new platforms like KaiOS.

• Significance:

  • The widespread adoption of MFS during the pandemic has demonstrated its potential to promote financial inclusion, but it is essential to ensure that low-literate users can participate without barriers.
  • Designing user-friendly MFS interfaces for marginalized communities can enhance their economic independence while creating larger market opportunities for service providers.

• Research Motivation and Related Work:

  • Many scholars have explored the challenges of designing interfaces for low-literate users, proposing strategies such as reducing text, simplifying navigation structures, and using visual aids. However, most studies focus on touchscreen smartphones, leaving a research gap in addressing appstore-enabled featurephones.

Proposed Solution

• Methods or Solutions:

  • A human-centered design approach was adopted to develop a non-USSD, app-based mobile financial service prototype tailored for low-literate communities using KaiOS featurephones.
  • The design was iteratively optimized through experimental studies and user feedback to reduce navigation errors, simplify operational steps, and improve usability.

• Innovations:

  • Proposed a set of user interface design guidelines tailored for low-literate users while addressing the hardware limitations of featurephones.
  • Explored intuitive design strategies such as cartoon icons and color-coded schemes to enhance users’ understanding of button functions.

• Implementation Steps and Techniques:

  • The research included the following stages:
    1. Stage 1: Focus group discussions to explore technological access challenges faced by low-literate communities.
    2. Stage 2: Design sprints to create initial interface concepts based on personas and user needs.
    3. Stage 3: In-depth exploration of featurephone user behaviors to generate a requirements list and design guidelines.
    4. Stage 4: Development of an application prototype based on earlier stages, followed by multiple rounds of user testing and feedback collection.

Research Outcomes

• Specific Outcomes:

  • Developed a mobile payment application prototype named "Prokash" for KaiOS featurephones.
  • Proposed three major design guidelines:
    1. Minimize button operations to improve navigation efficiency.
    2. Optimize vertical scrolling to avoid complex directional key operations.
    3. Use task-relevant icons and intuitive visual cues.
  • The application supports local languages (e.g., Bengali) and numeric input, catering to the habits of local users.

• Advantages of the Solution:

  • Enhanced user satisfaction and independent operation capabilities for low-literate users.
  • Increased trust and acceptance of financial services among featurephone users without raising device costs.

• Experimental or Evaluation Results:

  • User testing revealed that the improved application significantly reduced navigation errors and effectively assisted users in completing transactions.
  • Local language support within the application was identified as a key factor in enhancing user experience.

• Limitations and Future Directions:

  • The current study is limited to low-literate communities in Bangladesh; future research could expand to Africa and other marginalized regions.
  • The study did not deeply explore improvements to featurephone operating system icons, which could be a topic for future development.
  • Future work could incorporate voice prompts and interactive training to further optimize user experience.

This study demonstrates the potential of combining featurephones with low-literate users, providing significant insights for ICTD research and socially inclusive technology design. It paves the way for more socially inclusive technological solutions.