Abstract
Tangible user interfaces change the way we interact with digital information, with physical affordances that are distinctly different from pointing and keyboard/mouse interaction. As a precursor to studying the impact of tangible interfaces on design cognition, this paper presents a coding scheme for measuring the difference between two types of user interfaces: tangible and pointing. We perform a case study, using data collected from an experiment in which participants are asked to make word combinations from a set of six nouns and give them meaning. The task is presented as a design task with references to function, behavior, and structure of the word combination meanings. The case study shows large differences in gesture and action between the two conditions. We conclude with hypotheses on how interaction modalities that afford more body movement may have an impact on creativity and design cognition.
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Acknowledgements
This research was funded by NFS Grant No. IIS-1218160 to M. L. Maher, T. Clausner, and A. Druin. The author contributions of this paper are: Clausner led the design of the experiment, which yielded data for coding and analysis both by cognitive scientific methods (in preparation), and the FBS coding and analysis (this paper) were led by Maher and Gero, with assistance by Lee and Yu.
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Maher, M.L., Lee, L., Gero, J.S., Yu, R., Clausner, T. (2017). Characterizing Tangible Interaction During a Creative Combination Task. In: Gero, J. (eds) Design Computing and Cognition '16. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44989-0_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44989-0_3
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