Graphical user interface issues of mobile applications for children and solution suggestions for these issues

In recent years, rapidly developing touch screen tablet computers have begun to be included in education curricula in many countries due to their ease of transport and interactive content. However, the graphical interfaces of mobile education applications produced for these devices are mostly designed by adults and are based on their adult assumptions about children. Therefore, the user interface designs that are not suitable for children's development processes are emerging. The reason is that adult designers do not have enough knowledge about the perceptions and preferences of children. When examining the mobile education applications produced for tablets, many design elements in the user interface of these applications have encountered that can lead perception problems for children. In addition, when a study is conducted on the standard requirements for a child-centred user interface design, it has been determined that there is not enough scientific research and information on these topics in Turkey. This thesis study includes detailed analysis of some user interface design problems identified as a result of investigation on mobile education applications designed for children, and includes solution suggestions to make the user interface design elements child friendly as a result of these analyses. Within the scope of the research, it has been seen that the most common design problems in the user interface of education applications are misused typography and icon elements. Data, which is about the way children perceive these interface design elements and their preferences, has been collected using scientific research methods such as questionnaires and tests. The data collection process was carried out with participants who were randomly selected from fifth grade students with an average age of 9-11 years. The data obtained are interpreted statistically using quantitative data analysis methods via SPPS program. The hypotheses determined at the beginning of the study have been commonly confirmed. As a result, some important findings were obtained; it has been found that the fonts used in the mobil application interfaces have affected the children's reading performance with a statistically significant result, and the different icon formats used in the user interfaces have affected the perception and preferences of the children.