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User Perceptions of Haptic Fidgets on Mobile Devices for Attention and Task Performance
Abstract
Fidgeting, while primarily recognized as a distinguishing characteristic of neurodevelopmental conditions such as autism or ADHD, has also recently been recognized as a potential focus and attention aid for learning in traditional classroom environments. Everyone fidgets to greater or lesser extents, perhaps everyone can benefit from fidgeting aids to refocus attention. The recent explosion in popularity of fidgeting aids, such as fidget spinners, fidget cubes, and other toys highlights the broad appeal of these objects. Human-Computer Interaction researchers have taken an interest in the contributions of fidgeting to productivity. While these works connect the concepts of visual and motor stimulus as meaningful fidgets, little investigation has been done as to the potential contributions of haptic stimulus in digital fidgets. We designed and tested haptic mobile fidgets and compared their effects on task performance and user preference against the traditional spinner and no fidget apparatus.
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Motor stereotypies are common, repetitive, rhythmic movements with typical onset in early childhood. While most often described in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and intellectual disability (ID), stereotypies can also present without developmental delay and persist into adulthood. Stereotypies are often disruptive and harmful, both physically and socially, and effective evidence-based treatments are lacking. This can be attributed, in part, to our incomplete knowledge of the underlying biological and environmental risk. Several studies implicate various neurotransmitters, brain circuits, anatomical loci, and pre- and post-natal environmental influences in stereotypy onset and symptom severity. However, there are few points of convergence among a relatively small number of studies, indicating that more research is needed to confirm the underlying bases of risk. Of particular note is the lack of published genetic studies of stereotypies, despite evidence for Mendelian inheritance patterns in some families. Focusing future studies on typically-developing children with primary motor stereotypies may be a useful approach to minimize potential biological, environmental, and genetic heterogeneity that could theoretically hinder consistent findings. Ultimately, a deeper understanding of the underlying biology and risk factors for motor stereotypies will lead us closer to more effective targeted therapies that will alleviate suffering in affected children.
Prolonged inactivity in office workers is a well-known contributor to various diseases, such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular dysfunction. In recent years, active workstations that incorporate physical activities such as walking and cycling into the workplace have gained significant popularity, owing to the accessibility of the workouts they offer. While their efficacy is well documented in medical and physiological literature, research regarding the user experience of such systems has rarely been performed, despite its importance for interactive systems design. As a case study, we focus on active workstations that incorporate under desk elliptical trainers, and conduct controlled experiments regarding work performance and a four week long field deployment to explore user experience with 13 participants. We investigate how such workouts influence work performance, when and why workers work out during working hours, and the general feelings of workers regarding usage. Our experimental results indicate that while work performance is not influenced, the cognitive load of tasks critically influences workout decisions. Active workstations were alternatively used as mood enhancers, footrests, and for fidgeting, and there exist unique social and technical aspects to be addressed, such as noise issues and space constraints. Our results provide significant implications for the design of active workstations and interactive workplaces in general.
We present our early work in developing a playful technology to purposefully engage users' interrelated bodily motions, affective states, and cognitive functions to selectively enhance creativity, focus, etc. integral to modern productivity. Building interactions inspired by and embodying the elements of fidgeting, doodling, and other "mindless" activities, we seek to demonstrate the value of secondary human computer interactions able to enhance a user's state in primary productivity tasks.
We present our ongoing work to develop the concept of physical "margin" spaces around software and a new type of human computer interaction. Our novel "Fidget Widgets" seek to engage users' interrelated bodily motions, affective states, and cognitive functions to selectively enhance creativity, focus, calm, etc. Building playful interactions embodying "mindless" activities like doodling, fidgeting, and fiddling, we are working to demonstrate the value of incidental tangible interactions in the physical spaces surrounding digital workspaces. We intend these secondary interactions to have no intrinsic goals; rather these interactions extrinsically enhance a user's state toward the completion of their primary tasks.
Measuring fidgeting is an important goal for the psychology of mind-wandering and for human computer interaction (HCI). Previous work measuring the movement of the head, torso and thigh during HCI has shown that engaging screen content leads to non-instrumental movement inhibition (NIMI). Camera-based methods for measuring wrist movements are limited by occlusions. Here we used a high pass filtered magnitude of wearable tri-axial accelerometer recordings during 2-minute passive HCI stimuli as a surrogate for movement of the wrists and ankles. With 24 seated, healthy volunteers experiencing HCI, this metric showed that wrists moved significantly more than ankles. We found that NIMI could be detected in the wrists and ankles; it distinguished extremes of interest and boredom via restlessness. We conclude that both free-willed and forced screen engagement can elicit NIMI of the wrists and ankles.
Embodied trainings allowing children to move their whole body in space have recently been shown to foster and support the acquisition of basic numerical competencies (e.g., magnitude understanding, addition performance). Although embodied trainings studies varied in aspects such as training content, control training, addressed age group, or the amount of movement involved, they yielded very similar results: The embodied trainings not only led to specific improvements in the content trained, but also improved children’s performance in transfer tasks (e.g., addition or counting) that were not trained directly.
Following a brief summary of recent embodied training studies, we integrate the respective results into a unified model framework to elucidate the working mechanisms of embodied trainings: Mapping processes, interaction between different regions of personal space, and the integration of different spatial frames of reference are addressed as potential factors underlying the effectiveness of embodied numerical trainings.
Such an integrating view on these recent training studies also allows us to evaluate under which circumstances embodied trainings work best, that is, for which age group and/or which numerical content embodied trainings should be most beneficial. Finally, we draw conclusions about when and how such trainings may be applied by teachers and educators.
We argue that embodied self-regulation---managing attention and emotion through physical activity---is an underexplored opportunity for HCI researchers and practitioners. We present research exploring the self-regulation design space through the use of Fidget Widgets---objects manipulated with the hands alongside daily deskwork. Through a novel qualitative study method we collected 132 exemplars of these behaviors and objects. We employed Tumblr, a social media site, as a formative research instrument and used a grounded theory approach to reveal patterns in physical properties and use. Submissions were markedly varied and included evocative, colorful descriptors such as "crinkly", "squishy", and "clickyclackety" revealing a sensory experience and desires far different than those typically associated with computational work. Our analysis of the submissions revealed evidence of self-regulation towards achieving calm, focus, and creativity; additionally, design opportunities in somesthetics and social context emerged. Our ongoing research has implications for HCI practitioners working in tangible computing and peripheral interaction as well as for those supporting wellbeing through interactive technology design.
Inclusion in the general education classroom is becoming the placement of choice for many students with autism. Autism is a disorder that can impact many aspects of a child's learning experience. A child's profile along the continuum of Autism Spectrum Disorders dictates the severity of impairment in language engagement, social connectedness, sensory integration, and cognitive skills. This can often be overwhelming for teachers who are uninformed and untrained in the unique issues of autism. Teacher awareness and understanding of behaviors and perceptions unique to these disorders can facilitate the development and implementation of strategies created specifically to ease this potentially overwhelming situation for students and teachers.
The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of a traditional recess on the subsequent classroom behavior of children with a diagnosis of Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). In addition, the time of recess was matched to the behavior of the individual children diagnosed with ADHD based on prior assessment of their class-room behavior as a function of time of confinement in the classroom. All results were evaluated using single-case designs. Results showed that levels of inappropriate behavior were consistently higher on days when participants did not have recess, compared with days when they did have recess. Results also showed that the level of inappropriate behavior for all participants progressively increased over time on days when they did not have recess. However, this progressive increase did not occur on days when the participants had recess.
This paper reexamines the visual search process, and visual information processing more generally, from a perspective of the
continuous flow of information and responses through the visual system. The results from three experiments are reported which
support the continuous flow conception: Information accumulates gradually in the visual system, with concurrent priming of
responses. The first two experiments investigated the processing of display stimuli which varied in size and figure-ground
contrast in a nonsearch task, and provided evidence confirming a continuous flow model. Experiment 3 employed an asynchronous
onset of target and noise and provided convergent evidence of the accumulative nature of information and response priming
in visual processing.
Observers viewed displays containing a variable number of distractors of one color and a target of another color. In some
experiments, the target and distractors maintained their color from trial to trial; in others, they reversed unpredictably.
Observers made a speeded two-choice judgment concerning either the presence, the color, or the shape of the odd-colored target.
With only one exception, all of these conditions produced the same pattern of results: reaction times remained constant as
the number of distractors increased. The exceptional result occurred when observers judged the shape of the odd-colored target
and the color of the target and distractors reversed unpredictably. In this case, reaction times decreased as the number of
distractors increased. These results are interpreted in terms of the attentional requirements of the different judgments and
the mechanisms that guide attention.
This paper reviews the relationship between attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and academic performance. First, the relationship at different developmental stages is examined, focusing on pre-schoolers, children, adolescents and adults. Second, the review examines the factors underpinning the relationship between ADHD and academic underperformance: the literature suggests that it is the symptoms of ADHD and underlying cognitive deficits not co-morbid conduct problems that are at the root of academic impairment. The review concludes with an overview of the literature examining strategies that are directed towards remediating the academic impairment of individuals with ADHD.
Boys classified as nonhyperactive learning-disabled (LD), hyperactive but not LD, and as normal in behavior and achievement were contrasted on a visual search task hypothesized to elicit differences in selective and sustained attention. As task complexity increased, both clinical groups took more trials to reach criterion than the normals, but contrary to expectation, their error patterns were more similar than different. Using a highly similar task, Pribram found that monkeys with frontal lobe lesions did not condition to the reward contingency as well as temporarily lesioned monkeys, who had greater difficulty discovering the correct cue when more than six objects comprised the field. Both LD and hyperactive children who were inefficient at searching out the to-be rewarded cue tended not to condition as well to the reward contingency. Hyperactives gained insight into the features of the game somewhat quicker than LD subjects but did not use this information consistently. The hyperactive and LD groups complained equally of becoming tired but more of the hyperactives wanted to quit and gave evidence in latency data and extraneous responses that they ceased to play the game in a straightforward way. The hyperactives but not the othere groups had negative correlation between accuracy and search latency during the latter phase of the experiment. The hyperactives' lack of 'tolerance for a problem' is theorized to account for their poor performance, whereas the LD children's poor performance reflects defects in selective as well as sustained attention.
Observers viewed displays containing a variable number of distractors of one color and a target of another color. In some experiments, the target and distractors maintained their color from trial to trial; in others, they reversed unpredictably. Observers made a speeded two-choice judgment concerning either the presence, the color, or the shape of the odd-colored target. With only one exception, all of these conditions produced the same pattern of results: reaction times remained constant as the number of distractors increased. The exceptional result occurred when observers judged the shape of the odd-colored target and the color of the target and distractors reversed unpredictably. In this case, reaction times decreased as the number of distractors increased. These results are interpreted in terms of the attentional requirements of the different judgments and the mechanisms that guide attention.
This controlled trial of a parent management intervention aimed to increase parental competence in management of problem behaviours associated with Asperger syndrome. The intervention compared two formats, a 1 day workshop and six individual sessions. Measures were taken on three occasions: pre-intervention, at 4 weeks, and at 3 month follow-up. Variables of interest were number and intensity of problem behaviours, and parent evaluation of social interaction skills. Results showed parents reporting fewer and lower intensity of problem behaviours and increased social interactions at 4 weeks and 3 months. Results held across formats and suggest that parent management training can provide an effective intervention for parents of a child with Asperger syndrome. Group differences on outcome measures and in the use of strategies are discussed along with limitations of the study.
Relationships between repetitive behaviors (RBs) and associated clinical features (i.e., cognitive and adaptive functioning levels, sleep problems, medication use, and other behavioral problems) were examined in two groups (High nonverbal IQ > or = 97 versus Low nonverbal IQ < or = 56) of children with autism spectrum disorders (n = 14; mean age = 10 years, 7 months). For the group as a whole, nonverbal cognitive ability (NVIQ) (as measured by the Leiter-R), adaptive functioning level, the presence of sleep problems, and three scales of the Aberrant Behavior Checklist (ABC) (Irritability, Lethargy, and Hyperactivity) were highly correlated with total RB scores on the Repetitive Behavior Scale-Revised (RBS-R). After controlling for NVIQ, adaptive level, sleep problems, and two scales of the ABC (Irritability and Lethargy) were not significantly associated with RB scores. However, there remained a significant positive correlation between the presence of RBs and the Hyperactivity scale of the ABC. Parent ratings of their stress levels and the presence of RBs in their children were highly correlated. The relationship between RBs and associated clinical features in autism is complex and future studies should control for cognitive ability when examining the direct and indirect relationships of these variables with RBs.
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