Investigating selection and reading performance on a mobile phone while walking
Abstract
More and more people interact with their mobile phone while walking. The presented research analyzes; firstly, the negative effect of walking when considering reading and target selection tasks, such as weaker performance and higher workload. Here, we focused on one-handed interaction with a touch screen whereby the thumb is used as the input device. Secondly, we analyze how these negative effects can be compensated by increasing the text size and the size of the targets to select on the mobile phone. A comparative user study was conducted with 16 participants who performed target acquisition and reading tasks while standing and walking. The results show that whilst performance decreases, cognitive load increases significantly when reading and selecting targets when walking. Furthermore, the results show that the negative effect regarding target selection can be compensated by increasing the target size, but the text reading task did not yield better performance results for a larger text size due to the increased demand for scrolling. These results can be used to inform future designs of mobile user interfaces which might provide a dedicated walking mode.
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In a mobile context users will often be performing a second action in addition to using the mobile application.
“In a mobile context users will often be performing a second action in addition to using the mobile application [8,10].”
From Usability of mobile applications: literature review and rationale for a new usability model (2013) · cites this paper as [8]
Using mobile applications while walking can slow down the walker's average walking speed.
“Research has shown that using mobile applications while walking can slow down the walker ' s average walking speed [8].”
From Usability of mobile applications: literature review and rationale for a new usability model (2013) · cites this paper as [8]
Cites
The information capacity of the human motor system in controlling the amplitude of movement.
Fitts, P. M. (1954) · Journal of Experimental Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0055392 · Cited by 6,466 · see citing works
Experimental designs balanced for the estimation of residual effects of treatments
Williams, E. (1949) · Australian Journal of Scientific Research Series A Physical Sciences · doi:10.1071/ch9490149 · Cited by 1,104 · see citing works
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Usability of mobile applications: literature review and rationale for a new usability model
Harrison, R., Flood, D., & Duce, D. (2013) · Journal of Interaction Science · doi:10.1186/2194-0827-1-1 · Cited by 736 · see citing works
Touch typing using thumbs: understanding the effect of mobility and hand posture
Nicolau, H., & Jorge, J. (2012) · Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · doi:10.1145/2207676.2208661 · Cited by 50 · see citing works
- Authors
- Schildbach, B., & Rukzio, E.
- Affiliations
- Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (DE)
- Lancaster University (GB)
- ORCID
- Rukzio, Enrico
- Venue
- Proceedings of the 12th international conference on Human computer interaction with mobile devices and services
- Publisher
- ACM
- Published
- 2010-09-07
- Pages
- 93-102
- OpenAlex
- W2028618039
- Cited by
- 154
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 11 · 2024: 13 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 12 · 2018: 11 · 2017: 11 · 2016: 8 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 10 · 2013: 10 · 2012: 9
- FWCI
- 6.85
- Type
- conference paper
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services (MobileHCI) (publishedVersion)
- Lancaster EPrints (Lancaster University) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- European Commission
- Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/G009708/1)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Interactive and Immersive Displays
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Usability and User Interface Design
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Human-Automation Interaction and Safety
- Keywords
- mobile phone use while walking, reading achievement, target selection, cognitive load, font size, target size, scrolling, mobile interface design
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