A Study on the Effect of Pre-cue in Simple Reactions on Control-on-Display Interfaces

Abstract

Objective: This study focuses on the effects of pre-cues informing the location of upcoming visual stimulus on finger movement response in the context of control-on-display interfaces. Background: Previous research on pre-cues focus on attention allocation and motion studies were limited to indirect control conditions. The design of this study aimed to collect data on the exact landing point for finger-tap responses to a given visual stimulus. Method: Controlled visual stimuli and tasks were presented on a UI evaluation system built using mobile web standards; response accuracy and response time were measured and collected as appropriate. Among the 16 recruited participants, 11 completed the experiment. Results: Providing pre-cue on the location of stimulus affected response time and response accuracy. The response bias, which is a distance from the center of stimulus to the finger-tap location, was larger when the pre-cue was given during a one-handed operation. Conclusion: Given a pre-cue, response time decreases, but with accuracy penalized. Application: In designing touch-screen UI's - more strictly, visual components also acting as controllers - designers would do well to balance human perceptual and cognitive characteristics strategically.