Harvey, M. and Pointon, M. (2019) Understanding in-context interaction: An investigation into on-the-go mobile search. Information Processing and Management, 56 (6). 102089. ISSN 0306-4573
Abstract
Recent years have seen a profound change in how most users interact with search engines: the majority of search requests now come from mobile devices, which are used in a number of distracting contexts. This use of mobile devices in various situational contexts away from a desk presents a range of novel challenges for users and, consequently, possibilities for interface improvements. However, there is at present a lack of work that evaluates interaction in such contexts to understand what effects context and mobility have on behaviour and errors and, ultimately, users’ search performance.
Through a controlled study, in which we simulate walking conditions on a treadmill and obstacle course, we use a combination of interaction logs and multiple video streams to capture interaction behaviour as participants (n = 24) complete simple search tasks. Using a bespoke tagging tool to analyse these recordings, we investigate how situational context and distractions impact user behaviour and performance, contrasting this with users in a baseline, seated condition. Our findings provide insights into the issues these common contexts cause, how users adapt and how such interfaces could be improved.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. This is an author produced version of a paper subsequently published in Information Processing and Management. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. Article available under the terms of the CC-BY-NC-ND licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). |
Keywords: | Mobile search; Distraction; Search experience; User study; Experimentation |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Information School (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 26 Feb 2020 11:50 |
Last Modified: | 26 Jul 2020 00:39 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Elsevier |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1016/j.ipm.2019.102089 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:157710 |
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Licence: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0