An investigation of actions not as planned

SIGLELD:8318.172(SSRC-HR--6290) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Recognising Erroneous and Exploratory Interactions

A better understanding of “human error” is needed to help overcome problems of people assuming they are to blame for their inability to use poorly designed technology. In order to investigate people's ability to recognize, and reflect on the causes of, particular types of errors, a problem solving environment was designed that allowed participants to verbally self-report erroneous and exploratory interactions. It was found that the pervasiveness of errors was recognizable but underlying cognitive and attentional causes of errors were not. Participants found that providing a causal account of device-specific errors during interaction was especially difficult. A striking feature of device-specific errors is that they involve actions that do not move an individual towards a goal state, but remain critical to performing a task correctly. Successfully identifying why an error has occurred requires an understanding of environmental cues and salience. Findings imply that HCI practitioners need to develop techniques to adjust the visual salience of cues, making it is possible to recognize and recover from error

Extreme Responses to Virtual Environment Exposure

An emetic response (a.k.a. vomiting) is certainly one of the most extreme responses to virtual environment (VE) exposure. This unpleasant response is thankfully quite rare (approximately 1 -2%) but when it does occur, the individuals afflicted are generally quite distraught that something that looks akin to watching television can have such adverse consequences. This paper examines the experiences of individuals who have had an emetic response during or after VE exposure. An effort is made to both identify factors that may predict who vomits and characterize the extent of symptoms they experience. Results indicate that VE system designers may be able to reduce emetic response rates by streamlining user movement control and simplifying visual scene content. The results also indicate it may prove difficult with current measures to predict who will experience an emetic response