Ashley Colley

The Geography of Pokémon GO: Beneficial and Problematic Effects on Places and Movement

The widespread popularity of Pokémon GO presents the first opportunity to observe the geographic effects of location-based gaming at scale. This paper reports the results of a mixed methods study of the geography of Pokémon GO that includes a five-country field survey of 375 Pokémon GO players and a large scale geostatistical analysis of game elements. Focusing on the key geographic themes of places and movement, we find that the design of Pokémon GO reinforces existing geographically-linked biases (e.g. the game advantages urban areas and neighborhoods with smaller minority populations), that Pokémon GO may have instigated a relatively rare large-scale shift in global human mobility patterns, and that Pokémon GO has geographically-linked safety risks, but not those typically emphasized by the media. Our results point to geographic design implications for future systems in this space such as a means through which the geographic biases present in Pokémon GO may be counteracted.

Exploring finger specific touch screen interaction for mobile phone user interfaces

Today, mobile phones with touch screens are widespread but as de facto, the interaction space is limited to single finger taps or multitouch gestures. In this paper, we present an investigation of a novel interaction concept for mobile phone touch screen input by distinguishing between different fingers. To explore the concept, we organized three user studies (number of participants 37, 13 and 25), where we charted the finger specific input performance, and evaluated the concept with both a Wizard-of-Oz prototype and a functional implementation. The salient results show, e.g. statistical differences in comfort and perceived speed for interacting with different fingers, and that users see value in finger specific functionality, especially in providing fast shortcuts to different functions and as a means to personalize the interaction with the device.

Squeezy bracelet: designing a wearable communication device for tactile interaction

While smartphones are increasing in size and complex features, new form factors for simple communication devices are emerging. In this paper, we present the design process for a wrist worn communication device, which enables the user to send text messages over a paired mobile phone. The process includes concept design, user evaluation, design iteration, prototype implementation, and evaluation of alternative interaction techniques. Our particular focus is towards the use of naturally tactile interfaces in a wearable wristband form factor. We present how users perceive deformable communication device concepts and two alternative squeeze based interaction techniques.

Clearing the virtual window: connecting two locations with interactive public displays

Public displays offer the possibility to open a virtual window to another place by showing a live video feed from a remote location. In this paper, we describe our research investigating connecting two spaces with pervasive displays, where the ability to see through the virtual window was user controlled. The set-up was designed to resemble a frozen window, where the user was able to melt the surface using gesture input. We organized a four day field study with four alternating designs to evaluate our system, and collected feedback from 14 users through online surveys and focus groups. Our salient findings reveal that Ice Window was perceived as fun and interesting, and it has potential for facilitate awareness and informal ways of collaboration not only between the two locations, but also at one side of the display. People were most comfortable with a design that implemented two-sided melting of the ice. This was perceived as best able to indicate communication attempts between the two locations whilst respecting privacy.

Charting Design Preferences on Wellness Wearables

This paper presents a study on peoples preferences with wearable wellness devices. The results are based on an online survey (n=84), where people assessed different features in wearable wellness devices. Our salient findings show that the highest rated features were the comfort of wearing the device and long battery lifetime. Altogether, factors related to the form factor and industrial design were emphasized, whereas social sharing features attracted surprisingly little attention.

Investigating mobile stereoscopic 3D touchscreen interaction

3D output is no longer limited to large screens in cinemas or living rooms. Nowadays more and more mobile devices are equipped with autostereoscopic 3D (S3D) touchscreens. As a consequence interaction with 3D content now also happens whilst users are on the move. In this paper we carried out a user study with 27 participants to assess how mobile interaction, i.e. whilst walking, with mobile S3D devices, differs from interaction with 2D mobile touchscreens. We investigate the difference in touch accuracy between 2D touchscreens and mobile S3D touchscreens and evaluate the minimum touch target size for mobile S3D touchscreens. The contributions of this paper are twofold: Firstly, we found the increase in minimum touch target size caused by walking was larger for a mobile S3D UI than for a 2D UI. Secondly, we present touch target sizes and aspect ratios required for reliable user interaction in each case. Additionally we examined differences in the angle at which users held the mobile S3D device compared to a 2D mobile device. We found that mobile S3D caused users to hold the device at a different angle when walking, compared to the 2D case. This first study of its kind provides valuable information to developers of the next generation of UIs and applications for mobile S3D displays and devices.

Design probes study on user perceptions of a smart glasses concept

Until today, mobile computing has been very much confined to conventional computing form factors, i.e. laptops, tablets and smartphones, which have achieved de facto design standards in outlook and shape. However, wearable devices are emerging, and especially glasses are an appealing form factor for future devices. Currently, although companies such as Google have productized a solution, little user research and design exploration has been published on either the user preferences or the technology. We set ourselves to explore the design directions for smart glasses with user research grounded use cases and design alternatives. We describe our user research utilizing a smart glasses design probe in an experience sampling method study (n=12), and present a focus group based study (n=14) providing results on perceptions on alternative industrial designs for smart glasses.

Insights from Deploying See-Through Augmented Reality Signage in the Wild

Typically the key challenges with interactive digital signage are (1) interaction times are short (usually in the order of seconds), (2) interaction needs to be very easy to understand, and (3) interaction needs to provide a benefit that justifies the effort to engage. To tackle these challenges, we propose a see-through augmented reality application for digital signage that enables passersby to observe the area behind the display, augmented with useful data. We report on the development and deployment of our application in two public settings: a public library and a supermarket. Based on observations of 261 (library) and 661 (supermarket) passersby and 14 interviews, we provide early insights and implications for application designers. Our results show a significant increase in attention: the see-through signage was noticed by 46% of the people, compared to 14% with the non-see through version. Furthermore, findings indicate that to best benefit the passersby, the AR displays should clearly communicate their purpose.

In-Car Touch Screen Interaction: Comparing Standard, Finger-Specific and Multi-Finger Interaction

In this paper, we explore a novel interaction technique for the automotive domain, distinguishing between different fingers when interacting with a touch screen, and compare it against standard and multi-finger gesture interaction. We conducted a pilot test (n=6) and final user evaluation of the interaction techniques (n=15) in an in-car context. We report that subjectively users found both alternative interaction techniques required less visual attention than normal touch screen interaction. Additionally, multi-finger interaction using 4 fingers simultaneously was found challenging by many users. Our approach targets to provide alternative interaction methods for touch screen UIs in cars, that reduce the amount of attention required for the interaction, and hence reduce the distraction from the concurrent driving task.

Investigating drone motion as pedestrian guidance

Flying drones have the potential to act as navigation guides for pedestrians, providing more direct guidance than the use of handheld devices. Rather than equipping a drone with a display or indicators, we explore the potential for the drones movements to communicate the route to the walker. For example, should the drone maintain a constant distance a few meters in front of the pedestrian, or should it position itself further along the navigation route, acting as a beacon to walk towards? We created a set of flying drone gestures and evaluated them in an online survey (n = 100) and an in-the-wild user test (n = 10) where participants were guided on a walking route by a flying drone. As a result, we propose an initial set of drone gestures for pedestrian navigation and provide further design recommendations.