Wayfinding Information Research Articles

Why individuals do not use emergency exit doors during evacuations: A virtual reality and eye-tracking experimental study

Despite being purposefully designed and strategically placed in buildings to facilitate efficient evacuation, emergency exit doors are frequently underutilized during evacuations. To address this issue, this study explores why individuals often fail to use emergency exit doors during evacuations via a virtual reality and eye-tracking experimental study and investigates human emergency wayfinding behaviors through the lens of perceptions and attention. The results show that individuals’ attention to wayfinding clues is positively related to their exit choices. Failure to notice an emergency exit door is a key contributor to explaining how familiarity affects the usage of the emergency exit door. Participants in the familiarity group were less likely to pay attention to the exit door and thus rarely use it. However, when participants had fixations on the door, their exit choices were not significantly different between the familiarity and unfamiliarity groups. In the present experiment, door color and type did not have a significant impact on participants’ visual attention and exit choices. Specifically, the effect of door type on participants’ exit choices was impaired by the presence of the stairwell sign. The experimental results reveal the conspicuity and visibility of exit doors and explicit and clear wayfinding information are crucial to increasing their usage during indoor evacuations.

Enhancing Wayfinding Experience in Low-Vision Individuals through a Tailored Mobile Guidance Interface

Individuals with low vision (LV) face daily wayfinding challenges, struggling with route establishment, direction recognition, and obstacle avoidance. Mobile navigation, though commonly relied upon, often clashes with LV visual conditions, particularly central scotomas from diseases like age-related macular degeneration (AMD), hindering the relay of crucial wayfinding information. Addressing this, we introduced a novel guidance interface post-literature review. In a VR-based user study involving 25 participants simulating LV experience, our map guidance interface enabled quicker navigation, improving system usability and presence. The resulting performance paralleled that of normal-vision individuals. This study demonstrated that modifying familiar navigation interfaces effectively addresses visual impairment conflicts, enhancing outdoor navigation for individuals with LV. The modifications extend benefits, enabling comparable wayfinding ease to individuals with normal vision.

Multiple layer digital wayfinding information: A study of user preferences for information content and design in wayfinding applications

Multiple layer digital wayfinding information: A study of user preferences for information content and design in wayfinding applications

Optimization Method of Subway Station Guide Sign Based on Pedestrian Walking Behavior

The appropriate distribution of the guide signs in subway stations can allow passengers to obtain direction and wayfinding information quickly and accurately. The existing setting methods of subway station guide signs mainly consider the locations of facilities and pedestrian flowlines in the station. Therefore, this research proposes an optimization method based on pedestrian walking behavior to set guide signs more realistically and increase the guidance efficiency of signs. Firstly, through on-site investigation, this research analyzed the walking behavior characteristics of pedestrians and measured the average speed of pedestrians in different spaces to quantify the walking characteristics. Then, the guidance level of guide signs was defined to describe the guide ability of each sign and was the basis for determining the distribution of the guide signs. The constraint of the distance between two adjacent guide signs was added according to the short-term memory of pedestrian walking identification. Moreover, the variable of the number of floors between the two adjacent signs was added to avoid calculating floor-by-floor. Finally, Xi’an Xiaozhai Station was selected as an example to verify the proposed optimization method using the AnyLogic 8.7.6. The results show that the guide sign optimization method based on pedestrian walking behavior proposed in this paper can obtain an accurate distribution of guide signs, which can decrease the outbound time by 18.51s at the most, and the thickness at the bottleneck decreases by 5.90%.

The sonic spectrums of skateboarding: from polarity to plurality

ABSTRACT The sounds produced by skateboards, or skatesounds, are a common basis of complaint among the urban public and yet a source of inspiration and joy for skateboarding participants. These opposing responses to skatesound have escaped scholarly attention due to skateboarding’s visuocentric culture, yet this disagreement is significant in planning for city-built skateparks, registering public complaints of skateboarders in city spaces, and adding hostile architecture like skate stoppers, which often pivot on this polarity of reactions to skatesounds. We present a spectrum of theoretical responses of skatesound to dispel these reactions, including subjectivism, semiotics, soundscapes, and texturology. We argue that for some people skatesounds may be merely subjective with either a positive or negative valence. For others, skatesound is associated with pro-social or anti-social behaviors. For some, skatesound is both associative and provides wayfinding information about a city. Lastly, we introduce a novel theory of texturology: that skateboarders possess a unique sensory knowledge of the surface materials and textures of the city through skatesound, a knowledge specific to skateboarding.

Cognition-driven navigation assistive system for emergency indoor wayfinding (CogDNA): Proof of concept and evidence

Attributed to the advances in sensing and visualization technologies, novel wayfinding assistive systems are becoming more accessible such as the augmented reality (AR)-based wayfinding guidance that provides immersive information about the space and environments. However, the excessive information provided by these new methods results in cognitive overload, leading to subpar performance. Especially for emergency wayfinding where responders need to process a large amount of information while performing search and hazard identification tasks, an overdesigned wayfinding user interface and excessive information can cause confusion or disorientation among responders. This study proposes and tests a real-time cognition-driven navigation assistive system for emergency wayfinding called CogDNA. CogDNA measures responders’ real-time cognitive load and mental status based on the high-frequent pupillometer and gazes tracking data. Then the elements and formats of the primary wayfinding information are adjusted based on the individualized cognitive load models and the mental fatigue status measured by the pupillometer data including gaze movement entropy and blink rate. To test the efficacy of CogDNA, a human-subject experiment (n = 31) was performed with local firefighters in a simulated emergency wayfinding task. Three conditions were presented including the control condition with a static wayfinding system, a self-adaption condition where responders could adjust information with gesture controls, and the auto-adaption condition that tailored information based on real-time cognitive load and mental status measures. The result shows that the proposed method reduces the workload and improves the performance of the responders during the wayfinding task. The self-reported assessments also indicate benefits of the proposed method in cognitive load. The findings prove the efficacy of adaptive wayfinding information systems based on real-time cognitive load measures for future emergency wayfinding tasks.

Wayfinding Information Syntheses: A Study of Wayfinding Efficiency and Behavior in Complex Outdoor Institutional Environment.

This research aims to investigate the effectiveness of wayfinding information (destination reference images) in real-time complex environmental settings through the syntheses of mobile and static information sources. This investigation will help in improving the wayfinding information design for complex institutional environments which will enhance the environmental legibility. Complex environments are challenging for wayfinding efficiency. Identification of the location and orientation are considered to be important for wayfinding efficiency. This study investigated the user behavior in synthesizing the wayfinding information for identifying the users' location and orientation in a complex environment. Twenty-five university students have participated in the desktop-based virtual reality experiment. Five experimental conditions were developed for the assessment of wayfinding efficiency and users' preferred information sources. Reference images of destinations with user-matched angles were found more effective than the building's facade images. Participants synthesized the mobile wayfinding information with real environmental information to identify their location and orientation. Real environment information (road intersections and shape of the road) and mobile information (reference images of building facades) were found influential in the identification of the user's location and orientation. The study suggested a need for thorough investigation regarding the users' wayfinding behavior with different types of environmental information. Future studies have been recommended to investigate other complex institutional environments with larger sample groups for enhancing environmental legibility and institutional efficiency.

A Review on Wayfinding Information in Complex Environment

Wayfinding systems function as a concept intended to assist people in finding their way from a point to a final destination efficiently and as quickly as possible while also making the journey a pleasant experience. Although the concept appears to be simplistic, planning a wayfinding system is a challenging task particularly in complex environments. This paper attempts to explain the prime concept and the function of wayfinding information systems (WIS) focusing on a complex environment based on an extensive review of literature. The purpose of WIS is not only to provide an efficient navigation map but also to create a pleasant and less stressful atmosphere especially to exhausting travelers. Consideration for simplicity and ease of navigation is essentially the prime goal in planning and designing a practical WIS especially in complex environments. Keywords: Wayfinding, Wayfinding Information System (WIS), Complex Environment, Environment Cues eISSN: 2398-4287 © 2020. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v7iSI7%20(Special%20Issue).3770

A Correlation Analysis between the Sense of Direction and Spatial Visualization in the Wayfinding System of a Complex Environment

This paper presents the findings of an ongoing study that explores the potential relationship between visitors' sense of direction and spatial ability in the context of navigation experience on a university campus. A structured questionnaire and tests were administered to 57 visitors who were unfamiliar with the Universiti Teknologi MARA, Puncak Alam, Selangor campus. The findings suggest that visitors' sense of direction and spatial ability are not significantly correlated. Although previous research has demonstrated a positive correlation between spatial visualization ability and a sense of direction, the relationship between these two factors may be more complex. Effective wayfinding systems require the consideration of visitors' spatial ability, as well as other cognitive processes involved in wayfinding, such as attention, memory, and decision-making of visitors' spatial ability as well as other cognitive processes involved in wayfinding, such as attention, memory, and decision-making. The findings of this study arguably contribute to the discussion of navigation and wayfinding in a complex environment.

Cognitive characteristics in firefighter wayfinding Tasks: An Eye-Tracking analysis

During search and rescue, firefighters need to find paths in an unfamiliar space with minimum time and information available. The effective memorization and retrieval of critical spatial information can help reduce risks and increase mission efficiency. Although evidence has shown that different formats of wayfinding information, including landmarks, routes, and surveys, can impact search and rescue performance in different manners, a deeper understanding of the characteristics of firefighters’ cognitive processes related to the varying wayfinding information formats is less explored. To evaluate firefighters’ performance and cognitive characteristics in search and rescue, a firefighter experiment in Virtual Reality (VR) was conducted. Firefighters (n = 40) were recruited to participate in the simulated rescue task. After reviewing the spatial information in different formats, firefighters were requested to find three victims inside a VR maze as quickly as possible. Task performance was evaluated by the number of victims found and the time spent. Firefighters’ gaze patterns were analyzed to evaluate their cognitive status. The result showed that although the cognitive load under the survey and route conditions was significantly higher than under the landmark condition (p < 0.001), the decision-making involved a more effective cognitive process related to choosing the right path at critical waypoints such as where a turning decision must be made. Thus, the perceived workload and fatigue levels of the two conditions were lower, and the wayfinding performance was better. In contrast, with landmark information, the cognitive load levels were consistently high, along with increased mental fatigue.The findings reveal a series of cognitive features related to a more effective spatial decision-making in search and rescue. In the future, it is expected that these cognitive features can be used to develop real-time monitoring and prediction models for wayfinding performance.

The syntheses of static and mobile wayfinding information: an empirical study of wayfinding preferences and behaviour in complex environments

PurposeThe efficient delivery of environmental information to wayfinders in complex environments is a challenge for information designers. Wayfinding tasks can be quite strenuous and frustrating in the visual absence of dedicated wayfinding information. This study aims to explore the behaviour regarding the use of wayfinding information by navigators in complex environments.Design/methodology/approachAn experiment has been conducted in which participants have performed wayfinding tasks in a spatially complex university campus. The participants were instructed to use the think-aloud protocol during the experiment. The behaviour has been recorded using the head-mounted video recorder (GoPro), mobile phone screen (audio\\video) recorder and interview. Twelve university students have been selected based on the equal level of spatial ability using the Santa Barbara Sense of Direction scale. Each participant performed three wayfinding tasks to locate the unknown locations inside the campus using a mobile wayfinding application and other information sources.FindingsThe results of this study demonstrated significant behavioural preferences in acquiring wayfinding information. Most of the participants synthesised the static and mobile wayfinding information sources, while some preferred only the static ones. Gender differences have also been found for planning and route finding. This study recommends the syntheses of static and mobile wayfinding information for designing an efficient institutional wayfinding system.Research limitations/implicationsThe sample size has been kept small because of the qualitative exploration of the wayfinding behaviour regarding the wayfinding information syntheses behaviour. The experiment findings can be further explored with larger data set and controlled behavioural metrics. This study can help understand the user requirements in facilities management for spatially complex institutional environments.Practical implicationsThe current findings can be further used to develop a framework for wayfinding information designers to assist them in understanding the current practices and incorporate them for improving institutional wayfinding systems. The management of the offered facilities within an institution can be further improved to make the space more efficient by saving users’ time and efforts.Originality/valueInformation syntheses or symbiosis of environmental information with the beacon-based digital wayfinding system is a new concept. This study explores the potential of such information syntheses for enhancing the legibility of complex institutional environments.

How Attractive are Public Transport Interchanges? A Cross Comparison of Two European Terminals

As the world becomes more urbanized, there is a strong need for urban public transport to provide sustainable alternative solutions against private-vehicle usage. However, the opportunities for seamless journeys through public transport are still limited and the need for properly designed and operated transport interchanges is vital. The present paper investigates the perceptions and the users' level of satisfaction when using the New Railway Station of Thessaloniki in Greece and the Riga International Coach Terminal in Latvia, in terms of services provision and station's operation. In total, 36 indicators were tested, grouped in eight quality factors, namely travel information, wayfinding information, time and movement, access, comfort and convenience, station attractiveness, safety and security and emergency situation handling. Attitudinal surveys were implemented to determine key performance factors that affect travelers' satisfaction when using the two terminals. Data were collected through on-line questionnaires and were elaborated through descriptive and inferential statistics, including Mann-Whitney two-sample U-testing to assess differences between the samples in variables measured on a 5-point Likert scale, Spearman bivariate correlations to measure the strength of association between the quality indicators and multiple regression analyses to examine the effect of selected attributes on the general satisfaction level of travelers. Results showed that both interchanges perform better in physical quality attributes, like access, travel and wayfinding information provision, but they do not satisfy users' aesthetics expectations in the internal and external area of the interchanges and the surrounding area and they do not cover adequately their feeling of security and safety in the transfer or waiting areas. These results highlighted the users' preferences and concerns which contribute into a satisfactory overall design of the interchanges. In a nutshell, transport interchange design should satisfy both providing a hub for seamless mobility, but also integrating the station as a part of the public realm.

A cross-cultural investigation of design and visual preference of signage information from Hong Kong and Pakistan

Signage design has been considered critically important for wayfinding, being a functional medium of delivering environmental information. Complex institutional environments have several factors affecting the wayfinding, including but not limited to the design of information signage and its visual preference. Visual preferences of information design in wayfinding signage vary, depending on the cultural and individual differences. This study explores the variance in design and visual preferences of wayfinding signage and its influencing elements. Responses through online questionnaire have been accumulated by the participants from Hong Kong and Pakistan based on their design and visual preference of campus wayfinding signage. Questions were asked related to the user preferences for signage colour if in line with the institutional visual identity, mono or multi-colour coding of information and its visual volume. In total, 170 university students and visitors participated in the exploratory study from the respective countries. The results demonstrated that participants of Hong Kong preferred inline colours of signage, along with mono or less colour coding and detailed information. While the other group preferred attractive colours with multi-colour coding and less detailed wayfinding information with pictograms. Individual differences concerning age, literacy level and gender were also computed, however trivial differences have been recorded. This study suggests the need for detailed cross-cultural investigation concerning elements of signage design and visual preference to identify the drivers for culturally consistent university signage.

A CNN-based personalized system for attention detection in wayfinding tasks

Firefighters are often exposed to extensive wayfinding information in various formats owing to the increasing complexity of the built environment. Because of the individual differences in processing assorted types of information, a personalized cognition-driven intelligent system is necessary to reduce the cognitive load and improve the performance in the wayfinding tasks. However, the mixed and multi-dimensional information during the wayfinding tasks bring severe challenges to intelligent systems in detecting and nowcasting the attention of users. In this research, a virtual wayfinding experiment is designed to simulate the human response when subjects are memorizing or recalling different wayfinding information. Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are designed for automated attention detection based on the power spectrum density of electroencephalography (EEG) data collected during the experiment. The performance of the personalized model and the generalized model are compared and the result shows a personalized CNN is a powerful classifier in detecting the attention of users with high accuracy and efficiency. The study thus will serve a foundation to support the future development of personalized cognition-driven intelligent systems.

The efficacy of campus wayfinding signage: a comparative study from Hong Kong and Pakistan

PurposeComplex environments have a paucity of visual wayfinding information creating a strenuous situation for the new visitors. University campuses situated in the central urban areas with multi-storey structures and complex spatial layouts have poor environmental legibility. International students and visitors with diverse cultural backgrounds feel disoriented during wayfinding in these environments. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the cultural and individual differences affecting wayfinding behaviour.Design/methodology/approachAn online wayfinding survey has been conducted through a questionnaire from 170 university students and visitors from Hong Kong and Pakistan. A five-point bipolar Likert scale has been used to evaluate wayfinding problems and ascribed behaviour.FindingsThe results enunciated a substantial influence of culture on the decision-making process and wayfinding behaviour. Critical differences have been documented based on the country of origin and native language. Individual-related differences (age, gender, spatial familiarity, education, etc.) were computed, where age and spatial familiarity being noted as key factors impacting the respondents’ opinion. Future exploration has been discussed for the pivotal elements regarding wayfinding information signage using computer simulations.Research limitations/implicationsThe investigation can be further moved towards the other complex environments with fused facilities for a better understanding of wayfinding behaviour.Practical implicationsThe findings can be instrumental for improved access to user facilities and can reinforce the user’s trust and dependence on the institutional facility management.Originality/valueIn the wayfinding study, no cross-cultural (individualists vs collectivists) study has been conducted in a university campus to investigate the wayfinding difficulty and ascribed behaviour, especially when the environment is unfamiliar.

Indoor Localization for Visually Impaired Travelers Using Computer Vision on a Smartphone.

Wayfinding is a major challenge for visually impaired travelers, who generally lack access to visual cues such as landmarks and informational signs that many travelers rely on for navigation. Indoor wayfinding is particularly challenging since the most commonly used source of location information for wayfinding, GPS, is inaccurate indoors. We describe a computer vision approach to indoor localization that runs as a real-time app on a conventional smartphone, which is intended to support a full-featured wayfinding app in the future that will include turn-by-turn directions. Our approach combines computer vision, existing informational signs such as Exit signs, inertial sensors and a 2D map to estimate and track the user's location in the environment. An important feature of our approach is that it requires no new physical infrastructure. While our approach requires the user to either hold the smartphone or wear it (e.g., on a lanyard) with the camera facing forward while walking, it has the advantage of not forcing the user to aim the camera towards specific signs, which would be challenging for people with low or no vision. We demonstrate the feasibility of our approach with five blind travelers navigating an indoor space, with localization accuracy of roughly 1 meter once the localization algorithm has converged.

AUTOSIGN: A multi-criteria optimization approach to computer aided design of signage layouts in complex buildings

To improve the efficiency and effectiveness of designing signage systems in buildings, we present AUTOSIGN – a design tool that supports user-in-the-loop and multi-criteria optimization of signage layouts in complex buildings. We formulate signage placement as a multi-objective optimization problem with competing objectives (i.e., total distance travelled, total number of turns, the centrality of decision points, path overlap, and number of decision taken) and constraints (i.e., user-specified sign location and orientation threshold), which we solve using a two-step approach. Firstly, an evolutionary method is used to optimize all combination of navigation paths based on cognitively inspired objective functions weighted by the designers. Secondly, a particle swarm optimization is used to optimize individual sign placement to maximize the exposure of wayfinding information (i.e., signage coverage area) from the optimized navigation graph generated. To evaluate the effectiveness of the tool, we apply it to the design of signage systems across two virtual 3D buildings. We generate signage layouts for both buildings and optimize each of them for user-defined criteria. Both optimized and non-optimized layouts are evaluated using an agent-based simulation. The simulation results demonstrate that even with fewer signs, the signage coverage area for the optimized layout increased by 18% on average. Finally, an expert-based VR walk-through and a System Usability Study is performed to further evaluate AUTOSIGN.

Information Theoretic Model to Simulate Agent-Signage Interaction for Wayfinding

Signage systems are critical for communicating spatial information during wayfinding among a plethora of noise in the environment. A proper signage system can improve wayfinding performance and user experience by reducing the perceived complexity of the environment. However, previous models of sign-based wayfinding do not incorporate realistic noise or quantify the reduction in perceived complexity from the use of signage. Drawing upon concepts from information theory, we propose and validate a new agent-signage interaction model that quantifies available wayfinding information from signs for wayfinding. We conducted two online crowd-sourcing experiments to compute the distribution of a sign’s visibility and an agent’s decision-making confidence as a function of observation angle and viewing distance. We then validated this model using a virtual reality (VR) experiment with trajectories from human participants. The crowd-sourcing experiments provided a distribution of decision-making entropy (conditioned on visibility) that can be applied to any sign/environment. From the VR experiment, a training dataset of 30 trajectories was used to refine our model, and the remaining test dataset of 10 trajectories was compared with agent behavior using dynamic time warping (DTW) distance. The results revealed a reduction of 38.76% in DTW distance between the average trajectories before and after refinement. Our refined agent-signage interaction model provides realistic predictions of human wayfinding behavior using signs. These findings represent a first step towards modeling human wayfinding behavior in complex real environments in a manner that can incorporate several additional random variables (e.g., environment layout).

Measuring Travellers’ and Stakeholders’ Satisfaction on Perceived Sustainability of a Transport Interchange

Abstract The present paper aims at measuring the satisfaction of travellers and stakeholders on perceived quality of service provided at the Latvian interchange “Riga International Coach Terminal” and understand whether there are any gaps between the two groups of involved parties, based on their perceptions and expectations. To this end, a travellers’ attitudinal survey was organized and interviews with representative stakeholders were conducted, in order to capture and analyse their attitudes and preferences and extract those attributes that affect their satisfaction. Results showed that the interchange performs well in physical quality attributes, such as travel and wayfinding information provision, but in terms of access and aesthetics expectations in the internal and external design, some contradictory findings were revealed between travellers and stakeholders, validating the fact that understanding users’ perceptions can work as vital input to policy makers’ perceptions of an integrated sustainable public transport system.

User Preferences on Route Instruction Types for Mobile Indoor Route Guidance

Adaptive mobile wayfinding systems are being developed to ease wayfinding in the indoor environment. They present wayfinding information to the user, which is adapted to the context. Wayfinding information can be communicated by using different types of route instructions, such as text, photos, videos, symbols or a combination thereof. The need for a different type of route instruction may vary at decision points, for example because of its complexity. Furthermore, these needs may be different for different user characteristics (e.g., age, gender, level of education). To determine this need for information, an online survey has been executed where participants rated 10 different route instruction types at several decision points in a case study building. Results show that the types with additional text were preferred over those without text. The photo instructions, combined with text, generally received the highest ratings, especially from first-time visitors. 3D simulations were appreciated at complex decision points and by younger people. When text (with symbols) is considered as a route instruction type, it is best used for the start or end instruction.