Cognitive Walkthrough - History

History

The method was developed in the early nineties by Wharton, et al., and reached a large usability audience when it was published as a chapter in Jakob Nielsen's seminal book on usability, "Usability Inspection Methods." The Wharton, et al. method required asking four questions at each step, along with extensive documentation of the analysis. In 2000 there was a resurgence in interest in the method in response to a CHI paper by Spencer who described modifications to the method to make it effective in a real software development setting. Spencer's streamlined method required asking only two questions at each step, and involved creating less documentation. Spencer's paper followed the example set by Rowley, et al. who described the modifications to the method that they made based on their experience applying the methods in their 1992 CHI paper "The Cognitive Jogthrough".