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Size Effects and Scale Effects on the Usability of Tablets in Finger Pointing and Dragging Tasks

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Advances in Ergonomics in Design

Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 485))

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Abstract

By comparing the operation times for the prevalent touch-input methods of 5 different display sizes in 4 applied tasks, this study examined the size effects and its interactions with movement scale effects in tablet PCs with the target sizes (W) and distance (A) proportionally increased (with a constant index of difficulty). Overall, task types (complexity) and the display sizes had significant effects and interactions. The 7″ display tasks underperformed the 9″–11″ displays (significantly in almost all the tasks except marginally significantly in the complex pointing tasks when compared to the 9″ and 10″ displays) and the 8″ display (significantly in the dragging tasks). Nevertheless, the increased distances and widths only result in non-significantly decreased operating times for increased display sizes from 8″ to 11″ in almost all the tasks. The motor scale effects seem to attenuate the size effects more profoundly in complex task types than in simple ones.

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Acknowledgments

Funding for this project was provided in part by Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), Taiwan (MOST 104-2221-E-036-011). Special thanks to Ms. Fang-Ling Chen for her helpful suggestions and assistance with the word processing.

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Correspondence to Chih-Chun Lai .

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Lai, CC., Kuo, LW. (2016). Size Effects and Scale Effects on the Usability of Tablets in Finger Pointing and Dragging Tasks. In: Rebelo, F., Soares, M. (eds) Advances in Ergonomics in Design. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 485. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41983-1_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41983-1_11

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-41982-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-41983-1

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