ARound the Smartphone: Investigating the Effects of Virtually-Extended Display Size on Spatial Memory

TY - GEN

T1 - ARound the Smartphone

T2 - 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2023

AU - Hubenschmid, Sebastian

AU - Zagermann, Johannes

AU - Leicht, Daniel

AU - Reiterer, Harald

AU - Feuchtner, Tiare

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2023 Owner/Author.

PY - 2023/4

Y1 - 2023/4

N2 - Smartphones conveniently place large information spaces in the palms of our hands. While research has shown that larger screens positively affect spatial memory, workload, and user experience, smartphones remain fairly compact for the sake of device ergonomics and portability. Thus, we investigate the use of hybrid user interfaces to virtually increase the available display size by complementing the smartphone with an augmented reality head-worn display. We thereby combine the benefits of familiar touch interaction with the near-infinite visual display space afforded by augmented reality. To better understand the potential of virtually-extended displays and the possible issues of splitting the user's visual attention between two screens (real and virtual), we conducted a within-subjects experiment with 24 participants completing navigation tasks using different virtually-augmented display sizes. Our findings reveal that a desktop monitor size represents a "sweet spot"for extending smartphones with augmented reality, informing the design of hybrid user interfaces.

AB - Smartphones conveniently place large information spaces in the palms of our hands. While research has shown that larger screens positively affect spatial memory, workload, and user experience, smartphones remain fairly compact for the sake of device ergonomics and portability. Thus, we investigate the use of hybrid user interfaces to virtually increase the available display size by complementing the smartphone with an augmented reality head-worn display. We thereby combine the benefits of familiar touch interaction with the near-infinite visual display space afforded by augmented reality. To better understand the potential of virtually-extended displays and the possible issues of splitting the user's visual attention between two screens (real and virtual), we conducted a within-subjects experiment with 24 participants completing navigation tasks using different virtually-augmented display sizes. Our findings reveal that a desktop monitor size represents a "sweet spot"for extending smartphones with augmented reality, informing the design of hybrid user interfaces.

KW - augmented reality

KW - hybrid user interfaces

KW - spatial memory

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85160013060&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1145/3544548.3581438

DO - 10.1145/3544548.3581438

M3 - Article in proceedings

AN - SCOPUS:85160013060

SP - 1

EP - 15

BT - CHI 2023 - Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

PB - Association for Computing Machinery

Y2 - 23 April 2023 through 28 April 2023

ER -