Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) present all tools or commands graphically at fixed locations on an application's interface. While interacting with a GUI, users must find and visit these command locations. Experts already know these locations, so they can quickly find a command, but novices of GUIs must employ a slow visual search to find a command's location before interacting with it. As a result, the development of expertise in GUIs becomes slow. Spatial memory, that is responsible for learning and recalling locations, is a powerful way for users to become experts with GUIs, enabling people to remember the locations of already-visited items from memory. Spatial learning in the real-world benefits significantly from landmarks which provide a stable reference frame for nearby locations. However, most GUIs do not provide adequate landmarks. Therefore, learning and revisiting locations in GUIs can be slow and difficult. My research has introduced a novel idea that in the absence of clear and natural landmarks, artificial elements (e.g., icons or abstract blocks) can be landmarks in GUIs. With a series of studies, I revealed that landmarks can significantly aid in developing rapid user expertise in GUIs. However, our knowledge of using landmarks in GUIs is very limited. For example, we do not clearly know what can be used as landmarks in GUIs. Moreover, designing suitable landmarks for GUIs can be challenging as GUIs vary in layouts, sizes and the number of commands. As a result, landmarks useful in one GUI may become ineffective in another; further research is needed before designers can augment GUIs with proper landmarks. The proposed research program aims at filling the gaps in our knowledge about using landmarks in GUIs. To this end, my students and I will develop a comprehensive framework for landmarks in GUIs and investigate its potential applications. In the next five years, I will pursue three primary objectives. First, I will formalize a definition and attributes of landmarks for GUIs. Second, I will design a framework disclosing how GUIs can be augmented with local and global level landmarks. Last, I will apply the framework to design novel interactive applications in alternate platforms (e.g., desktops, small and large touch GUIs, and extended reality interfaces) to support rapid user expertise development in GUIs. This program is expected to advance Computer Science by contributing a complete landmark framework for GUIs and revealing empirical evidence-based new knowledge to strengthen the idea that landmarks can improve user expertise development in GUIs. This development will contribute novel interaction techniques for multiple platforms exploiting people's physical and spatial capabilities. Finally, it will provide guidelines for researchers and designers of future GUIs to design more memorable and efficient GUIs with landmarks, enabling the rapid transition of novice GUI users to experts.