Quantifying the impact of making and breaking interface habits. Issue 142 (October 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Garaialde, Diego; Bowers, Christopher P.; Pinder, Charlie; Shah, Priyal; Parashar, Shashwat; Clark, Leigh; Cowan, Benjamin R.
• Is Part Of: International journal of human-computer studies. Issue 142(2020)
• Publication Date: 2020-10
• Subjects: Interface habits -- User behaviour -- Breaking habit -- Interaction science -- Quantitative research; Human-machine systems -- Periodicals; Systems engineering -- Periodicals; Human engineering -- Periodicals; Human engineering; Human-machine systems; Systems engineering; Periodicals; Electronic journals; 004.019
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijhcs.2020.102461
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1071-5819

Abstract

Highlights: People become more accurate at option selection as they develop an interface habit. People also become faster at selecting correct options whilst habits develop. This gain in performance is eliminated when existing habits are disrupted. We show this pattern of results both in lab based and in the wild studies. Abstract: The frequency with which people interact with technology means that users may develop interface habits, i.e. fast, automatic responses to stable interface cues. Design guidelines often assume that interface habits are beneficial. However, we lack quantitative evidence of how the development of habits actually affect user performance and an understanding of how changes in the interface design may affect habit development. Our work quantifies the effect of habit formation and disruption on user performance in interaction. Through a forced choice lab study task ( n =19) and in the wild deployment ( n =18) of a notification dialog experiment on smartphones, we show that people become more accurate and faster at option selection as they develop an interface habit. Crucially this performance gain is entirely eliminated once the habit is disrupted. We discuss reasons for this performance shift and analyse some disadvantages of interface habits, outlining general design patterns on how to both support and disrupt them.