Observing another human's actions influences action planning, but what about merely anticipating them? In joint action settings where a partner's subsequent actions are a consequence of one's own actions, such contingent partner reactions can be regarded as action effects. Therefore, just like automatic effects they might facilitate those of a person's actions that overlap with them in relevant features. In Experiments 1 and 2, the spatial compatibility of contingent partner reactions was manipulated and compared with the influence of automatic effects. Experiment 1 used a simplistic scenario in which lateral keypress actions by the subject were responded to by mouse movements of a partner producing spatially compatible or incompatible visual effects. Experiment 2 transferred the paradigm to a more complex task in which subjects manually relocated virtual objects on a multi-touch display, and these or other objects were subsequently manipulated by the partner. In Experiment 1, compatible partner reactions speeded up subjects' preceding actions, whereas in Experiment 2 the influence was not statistically reliable. To test whether influences of partner reaction compatibility could be found in such naturalistic settings at all, Experiment 3 also used a multi-touch setting but varied temporal instead of spatial compatibility, which has several methodological advantages. This time, a compatibility effect emerged in subjects' movement initiation times, whereas contrast effects were found for movement durations. These findings indicate that the principles of ideomotor action control can be extended to joint action settings. At the same time, they also emphasize the importance of task features in determining whether our own behaviour is influenced by anticipations of another person's reactions.

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Establishing common ground in remote cooperation is challenging because nonverbal means of ambiguity resolution are limited. In such settings, information about a partner's gaze can support cooperative performance, but it is not yet clear whether and to what extent the abundance of information reflected in gaze comes at a cost. Specifically, in tasks that mainly rely on spatial referencing, gaze transfer might be distracting and leave the partner uncertain about the meaning of the gaze cursor. To examine this question, we let pairs of participants perform a joint puzzle task. One partner knew the solution and instructed the other partner's actions by (1) gaze, (2) speech, (3) gaze and speech, or (4) mouse and speech. Based on these instructions, the acting partner moved the pieces under conditions of high or low autonomy. Performance was better when using either gaze or mouse transfer compared to speech alone. However, in contrast to the mouse, gaze transfer induced uncertainty, evidenced in delayed responses to the cursor. Also, participants tried to resolve ambiguities by engaging in more verbal effort, formulating more explicit object descriptions and fewer deictic references. Thus, gaze transfer seems to increase uncertainty and ambiguity, thereby complicating grounding in this spatial referencing task. The results highlight the importance of closely examining task characteristics when considering gaze transfer as a means of support.

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Industrial production is still widely sustained by human operators. However, the design of human-machine interaction often does not foster the motivation to learn more about their machine or system. This may decrease operators' ability to flexibly adjust their decision making and problem-solving skills to the current production context. Motivation to learn could be attained by a motivating socio-technical design of assistance systems, but suitable and context-specific design strategies are lacking. In the present study, a systematic literature review of motivation theories in education, at the workplace, and in system design was carried out. The resulting 16 theories were integrated into a conceptual model of motivating assistance system design in industrial production. In this model, learning motivation results from the satisfaction of the needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness, which in turn is mediated through the design of the system (including interface, task, and behavior). Moreover, this process is subject to moderating influences from job characteristics, personal variables, and factors concerning the respective work domain. Strategies for motivational design are derived from the model, and an example from the discrete processing industry is used to illustrate how the model could be applied to design assistance systems in this domain. Finally, the procedures for theory selection and model development are discussed, theoretical and practical implications are derived, and alternative strategies of instilling motivation are considered.

Improved risk stratification of patients suspected of prostate cancer prior to biopsy continues to be an unmet clinical need. ExoDx Prostate (IntelliScore) “EPI” is a non-invasive urine test utilizing RNA from exosomes to provide a risk score that correlates with the likelihood of finding high grade prostate cancer at biopsy. Here, we present the results from a prospective clinical validation study of EPI-CE, a CE-marked in-vitro diagnostic (IVD) assay, specifically developed for use in European clinical laboratories. The study (NCT04720599) enrolled patients with ≥ 50 years, PSA 2–10 ng/mL, prior to MRI, who were scheduled for initial biopsy. First catch urine samples were collected from participants without prior digital rectal examination or prostate massage. Exosomal RNA was isolated and expression levels of three biomarkers ERG, PCA3 and SPDEF were analyzed according to the EPI-CE Instructions For Use. In the study cohort of N = 109 patients, EPI-CE was validated to have a Negative Predictive Value of 89%, a Sensitivity of 92% and a superior performance to two commonly used multiparametric risk calculators (PCPT and ERSPC) in both Receiver Operating Characteristics with a higher Area Under the Curve for EPI-CE 0.67 (95% CI 0.56–0.77) versus PCPT 0.59 (95% CI 0.47–0.71) and ERSPC 0.60 (95% CI 0.49–0.72) and higher Net Benefits analysis across a wide range of risk acceptance levels. This is the first clinical study reporting on the performance of EPI-CE. We demonstrate that EPI-CE provides information beyond standard clinical parameters and provides a better risk assessment prior to MRI, of patients suspected of prostate cancer, than the commonly used multiparametric risk calculators.

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