Multimodal Interfaces for Dynamic Interactive Maps

Sharon Oviatt
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Center for Human-Computer Communication
Oregon Graduate Institute of Science & Technology
P.O. Box 91000, Portland, Oregon 97291
(503) 690-1342; oviatt@cse.ogi.edu

ABSTRACT

Dynamic interactive maps with transparent but powerful human interface capabilities are beginning to emerge for a variety of geographical information systems, including ones situated on portables for travelers, students, business and service people, and others working in field settings. In the present research, interfaces supporting spoken, pen-based, and multimodal input were analyze for their potential effectiveness in interacting with this new generation of map systems. Input modality (speech, writing, multimodal) and map display format (highly versus minimally structured) were varied in a within-subject factorial design as people completed realistic tasks with a simulated map system. The results identified a constellation of performance difficulties associated with speech-only map interactions, including elevated performance errors, spontaneous disfluencies, and lengthier task completion time--- problems that declined substantially when people could interact multimodally with the map. These performance advantages also mirrored a strong user preference to interact multimodally. The error-proneness and unacceptability of speech-only input to maps was attributed in large part to people's difficulty generating spoken descriptions of spatial location. Analyses also indicated that map display format can be used to minimize performance errors and disfluencies, and map interfaces that guide users' speech toward brevity can nearly eliminate disfluencies. Implications of this research are discussed for the design of high-performance multimodal interfaces for future map systems.

Sharon Oviatt
Wed Dec 20 17:00:06 PST 1995