Developing Tactile Feedback to Augment Mobile Interaction and to Support Individuals with Situationally Induced Impairments and Disabilities (SIIDs)

Overview

As mobile technologies such as cellular telephones, reduce in both size and cost, and improve in fidelity, they become a more attractive option for performing tasks such as surfing the Web and accessing applications while on-the-go. The small size of the visual display limits the amount of information that can be presented, which may lead to cluttered interfaces. Tactile feedback (e.g. vibrations) provides one solution to reducing the burden on the visual channel.

Our research has examined ways to develop perceivable tactile icons (tactons) to aid in non-visual interactions with mobile applications. Parameters of touch have been manipulated, and distributed to a range of sites on the body. We have examined the impact of situational distracters (e.g. ambient sounds) and effects of movement when perceiving tactile feedback (situational induced impairments and disabilities - SIIDs). Methods to develop meaningful tactile feedback mappings have also been investigated.

System Development

Publications

• Saulynas, S. & Kuber, R. 2020: Understanding and Supporting Individuals Experiencing Severely Constraining Situational Impairments. Universal Access in the Information Society. 19(4), 919-933. DOI: 10.1007/s10209-019-00705-7.
• Saulynas, S., & Kuber, R., 2019: Designing Mobile Interaction Guidelines to Account for Situationally Induced Impairments and Disabilities (SIID) and Severely Constraining Situational Impairments (SCSI). To appear in Proceedings of the CHI'19 Workshop: Addressing the Challenges of Situationally-Induced Impairments and Disabilities in Mobile Interaction, Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI’19.
• Saulynas, S. & Kuber, R. 2018: Towards Supporting Mobile Device Users Facing Severely Constraining Situational Impairments. In Extended Abstracts of CHI'18, Montreal, Canada, LBW540.
• Wolf, F., Kuber, R., Pawluk, D. & Turnage, B. 2017: Towards Supporting Individuals with Situational Impairments in Inhospitable Environments. In proceedings of ASSETS’17, 349-350.
• Saulynas, S., Burgee, L. & Kuber, R. 2017: All Situational Impairments are not Alike: A Classification System for Situational Impairments and the Unique Nature of Severely Constraining Situational Impairments In proceedings of iConference'17, Wuhan, China.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R. & Sears, A. 2014: Supporting the Mobile Notification Process through Tactile Cues Selected using a Paired Comparison Task. In Extended Abstracts of CHI'14, Toronto, Canada, 1741-1746.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R., Sears, A. & Stanwyck, E. 2014: Determining the Efficacy of Multi-Parameter Tactons in the Presence of Real-world and Simulated Audio Distractors. Interacting with Computers 26 (6), 572-594.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R. & Sears, A. 2013: Designing Tactile Feedback to Support Mobile Users when Situationally Impaired. In proceedings of ASSETS'13, Bellevue, USA, Article No: 47.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R. & Sears, A. 2013: Tactile Notifications for Ambulatory Users. In Extended Abstracts of CHI'13, Paris, France, 1569-1574.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R. & Sears, A. 2011: Towards Developing Perceivable Tactile Feedback for Mobile Devices. International Journal of Human Computer Studies 69, 705-719.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R. & Sears, A. 2010: Maintaining Levels of Activity using a Haptic Personal Training Application. In Extended Abstracts of CHI'10, Atlanta, USA, 3217-3222.
• Qian, H., Kuber, R. & Sears, A. 2009: Towards Identifying Distinguishable Tactons for Use with Mobile Devices. In proceedings of ASSETS'09, Pittsburgh, USA, 257-258.

Students

• Huimin Qian (Ph.D.)
• Sidas Saulynas (Ph.D.)
• Ted O'Meara (MS)
• Katelyn Toy (MS)

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