Paper Reading 15 – Enhanced Area Cursors: Reducing Fine Pointing Demands for People with Motor Impairments

Comments
Patrick Frith
Paola Garza

Click-and-Cross cursor.

Reference Information
Enhanced Area Cursors: Reducing Fine Pointing Demands for People with Motor Impairments
 - Leah Findlater, Alex Jansen, Kristen Shinohara, Morgan Dixon, Peter Kamb, Joshua Rakita, and Jacob O. Wobbrock
 - UIST 2010, New York, New York

Summary
This group of researchers set out to find a better means for motor-impaired individuals to use cursors for selection on computers and devices.  They stated that the current solutions for this problem are insufficient.  In order to try and remedy this problem, they came up with four different cursor interaction and selection types.  Two were crossing cursors (a Click-and-Cross cursor and a Cross-and-Cross cursor) and the other two were magnification cursors (a Motor-Magnifier and a Visual-Motor-Magnifier).

Cross-and-Cross cursor.

The two crossing cursors selected items by crossing over or near the desired target.  The Click-and-Cross cursor required the user to first click and move the cursor outward until the resulting arc circumference crossed over the target.  Then the user moved the cursor near the desired area on the arc where the target was.  The other cursor of this type achieves similar results without the need for any clicking.

The two magnifying cursors use different means of magnification in order to aid the user in selecting targets.  The Motor-Magnifier uses a wide selection cursor to isolate an area, while an inset Bubble cursor then makes the selection within the magnifier.  No actual magnification is done with this method, but the mouse gain is decreased to simulate increased magnified behavior.  The other option is the Visual-Motor-Magnifier, which does actually magnify and does not alter mouse gain.  The larger viewing space helps the user choose the target.

Motor-Magnifier cursor.

For testing, 12 participants with motor impairments and 12 without impairments were asked to perform some task sessions ranging from 90-120 minutes long.  The participants were also given an introduction to the tools as well as being allowed to ask questions before proceeding with the tests.  The results showed that the overall error rate for impaired individuals was reduced by 82%.  They set out to find a better solution for aiding impaired individuals in selecting items, so they were very pleased with this result.

Visual-Motor-Magnifier cursor.

Discussion
I was actually not aware that this kind of need was such a big issue.  You don’t exactly hear a lot about it at least.  But now that they have discussed it, I think it is great that they have given so much attention to solving this problem for impaired individuals.  I was really impressed with their solutions as well.  The way they seem to allow a broad selection at first, and then refine the selection process to a more precise broad selection appears to be the perfect solution.  Now that they have proved that better solutions for this problem do exist, hopefully they will be further developed and available for OS’s in their accessibility options in the near future.