(Don't) Mind the Step: Investigating the Effect of Digital Social Cues on Navigation Decisions

2021. Luluah Albarrak, Oussama Metatla & Anne Roudaut
Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction.

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.

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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}
}