(Don't) Mind the Step: Investigating the Effect of Digital Social Cues on Navigation Decisions
2021. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction.
Luluah Albarrak, Oussama Metatla & Anne Roudaut.
It is well established that the presence of other people and the physical traces of their activities impact our navigation decisions, e.g. following a path in a park where trails are worn by frequent passage. Here we investigate such effect within a digital setup where social cues are displayed on the floor. We contribute the first lab study (n=24) investigating how social cues, presented as footprints on an interactive floor display, can impact navigation decisions. We particularly explore two task-based scenarios: exploration and search. A direct comparison of path choices did not reveal significant effects in both tasks but a further qualitative analysis showed that social cues affected path choices depending on how participants interpreted them. Additionally, results revealed a pattern of direct decision-making behaviours when social cues were present. We discuss how these insights can contribute to designing engaging floor interfaces that guide navigation decisions using social cues.
Full paper
https://doi.org/10.1145/3488537
Citation
Albarrak, L., Metatla, O., & Roudaut, A. (2021 , November). (don't) mind the step: investigating the effect of digital social cues on navigation decisions. Proc. ACM Hum.-Comput. Interact., 5(ISS). URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/3488537, doi:10.1145/3488537
BibTeX
@article{10.1145/3488537, author = {Albarrak, Luluah and Metatla, Oussama and Roudaut, Anne}, title = {(Don't) Mind the Step: Investigating the Effect of Digital Social Cues on Navigation Decisions}, year = {2021}, issue_date = {November 2021}, publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery}, address = {New York, NY, USA}, volume = {5}, number = {ISS}, url = {https://doi.org/10.1145/3488537}, doi = {10.1145/3488537}, abstract = {It is well established that the presence of other people and the physical traces of their activities impact our navigation decisions, e.g. following a path in a park where trails are worn by frequent passage. Here we investigate such effect within a digital setup where social cues are displayed on the floor. We contribute the first lab study (n=24) investigating how social cues, presented as footprints on an interactive floor display, can impact navigation decisions. We particularly explore two task-based scenarios: exploration and search. A direct comparison of path choices did not reveal significant effects in both tasks but a further qualitative analysis showed that social cues affected path choices depending on how participants interpreted them. Additionally, results revealed a pattern of direct decision-making behaviours when social cues were present. We discuss how these insights can contribute to designing engaging floor interfaces that guide navigation decisions using social cues.}, journal = {Proc. ACM Hum.-Comput. Interact.}, month = nov, articleno = {492}, numpages = {18}, keywords = {floor interfaces, navigation, path choice, social cues, traces} }