Effects of intelligent notification management on users and their tasks

Abstract

We present a novel system for notification management and report results from two studies testing its performance and impact. The system uses statistical models to realize defer-to-breakpoint policies for managing notifications. The first study tested how well the models detect three types of breakpoints within novel task sequences. Results show that the models detect breakpoints reasonably well, but struggle to differentiate their type. Our second study explored effects of managing notifications with our system on users and their tasks. Results showed that scheduling notifications at breakpoints reduces frustration and reaction time relative to delivering them immediately. We also found that the relevance of notification content determines the type of breakpoint at which it should be delivered. The core concept of scheduling notifications at breakpoints fits well with how users prefer notifications to be managed. This indicates that users would likely adopt the use of notification management systems in practice.

Interruptions in the wild: portraying the handling of interruptions in manufacturing from a distributed cognition lens

“…For example, Adamczyk and Bailey (2004) argued that the disruptive effects interruptions have on the users' task performance, emotional states, and social attribution may be decreased by identifying opportune moments for a notification to be presented. Identifying relevant breakpoints, the moment in time where one meaningful units of task execution succeeds another, in the primary task has been found to reduce frustration and reaction time (Iqbal and Bailey 2008), and allowing the user to prepare for task switching has been shown to reduce resumption lag (Andrews et al 2009;Iqbal and Bailey 2008;Ho and Intille 2005). Furthermore, Iqbal and Bailey (2007) examined the possibility to develop statistical models for detecting and differentiating breakpoints during the performance of interactive office tasks, e.g.…”

“…document editing. In a later study, the models were tested and they found that the models brought faster reactions to notifications and decreased the users' experienced level of frustration (Iqbal and Bailey 2008). According to Andrews et al (2009), alerting the users, either visually with a flashing screen or with a tone as an auditory cue, prior to an interruption decreases the users' resumption time, implying that alerts make the users resume the primary task quicker than when the interruption is unannounced.…”

Breaking the habit: Measuring and predicting departures from routine in individual human mobility

“…The evaluation of cost is usually framed as the problem of inferring the interruptibility of a user (and assumes fixed value, or benefit, for each notification). For example, Iqbal and Bailey [19] and Horvitz et al [20] evaluate the interruption cost based on the user's current activity. When the cost is high, the mobile device should refrain from (or delay) alerting the user about phone calls, reminders, or more application-specific events.…”

Finding the Right Way for Interrupting People Improving Their Sitting Posture

“…In the last decade, a number of research groups have presented a lot of work around interruption and recovery with the goal of having a highly efficient interrupt with low intrusion [4,7,8,12,13,14,20].…”