Abstract
In recent years, with rapid development of personal computer, more and more users find that it is becoming difficult to use some of the functions in software with theis experience and previous knowledge. Therefore, scholars proposed that metaphor-based interfaces may help users using new software easily by taking it up with pervious experiences and existing concepts. However individual background and experience of the users and designers diversify. In order to decrease the cognitive differences of the same metaphor between designers and users, Wang and Hwang (2000) proposed the concept of using basic metaphors for development of a computer system. They suggested a process for designing basic metaphors. The process, including common knowledge/experiences existing is aiming at identifying basic computer metaphors that can be recognized by ordinary users. Based on the basic metaphor identifying method introduced by Hwang (1998), this study focused on finding out teenagers’ commom knowledge/experiences that may represent the basic metaphors for computers. Thirteen computer metaphors identified in the pre-test by the teenages plus five metaphors identified from literatures were used as the input for a quertionnaires survey followed. The result indicates the eight metaphors which most subjects recognized easily can be considered most effective basic metaphors. It was verified in a following survey with adult subjects that among the eight most effective metaphors identified by the teenagers, only one of them was disagreed. If a designer could use an effective basic metaphor from teenagers’ experience for representing a computer system, most users would learn and use it easily. As time and location may change, the effectiveness of those basic metaphors may also change. Thus, a designer must use basic metaphors in designing if the goal is to make the system easy to understand and to use.