Jennifer Jerrams-Smith

Putting the virtual into reality: assessing object-presence with projection-augmented models

A projection-augmented model is a type of nonimmersive, coincident haptic and visual display that uses a physical model as a three-dimensional screen for projected visual information. Supporting all physiological depth cues and two sensory modalities should create a strong sense of the objects existence. However, conventional measures of presence have been defined only for displays that surround and isolate a user from the real world. The idea of object-presence is thus suggested to measure the subjective experience that a particular object exists in a users environment, even when that object does not (Stevens & Jerrams-Smith, 2000). A correlation study was conducted to demonstrate the reliability and validity of objectpresence as a construct. The results of a modified Singer and Witmer Presence Questionnaire suggest the existence of a reliable construct that exhibits face validity. However, the Presence Questionnaire did not correlate significantly with a users tendency to become immersed in traditional media, which would support the assertion that this construct was object-presence. Considering previous work, the results of the current correlation study exhibited a pattern evident in previous studies of presence suggesting that object-presence and presence could be gender biased by the task to be completed or by the presence measure.

An empirical study on the usability of an information navigation aid

The Computer Aided Information Navigation (CAIN) project provides a method of adaptive navigation support that aims to increase the World Wide Webs value as a pedagogical tool. To examine whether the systems approach improves comprehension under specific conditions, an experiment compared CAIN with conventional web tools on three measures of performance: comprehension scores, task completion times and user satisfaction. Results revealed that comprehension scores were 30% greater with CAIN than with the conventional tools and indicated that task completion times can also be reduced without compromising user satisfaction.