How Do Novice Older Users Evaluate and Perform Mid-Air Gesture Interaction for the First Time?

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“…Despite the increasing prevalence of mid-air gesture interaction across different interaction contexts (e.g. interactive displays, intelligent cars, virtual reality and gaming), standard practices for user interface design that support novice users in learning the appropriate gesture commands is still insufficient and overlooked [1,2,9]. As found in the present study, both static and animated pictorials accompanied with gesture labels resulted in faster and more accurate gesture making than pure text-based instructions for novice older users.…”

“…Recent studies have been focusing on finding coherent, easy and intuitive mid-air gestures for different interaction contexts [2] [6][17] [19] but little research has focused on investigating the most effective way of providing to novice users instructions on how to make those gestures once they have already been incorporated in an interface. As yet, the learnability of gesture commands by novice users is still a challenging aspect of gesture-based interfaces [9], and older adults (aged 60+) face even greater challenges when interacting with this novel input method [2].…”

“…Second, the exact spatial trajectory and kinematics of different mid-air gestures expected by the system may sometimes differ from novice users' understanding and expectation of these gestures prior to the interaction, and, if instructions are vague, misleading, or the actual gesture is not "straightforward" then the mismatch between the user's and the system's expectations can lead to failed gesture attempts, frustration, and may affect the overall usability of the interface [2]. For instance, questions such as "A finger pinch involves which fingers exactly?…”

“…Although this uncertainty about knowing how to make gestures might affect all novice users with no prior experience in gesturing in mid-air, older adults (60+) face greater difficulties and are generally more reluctant to adopt new unfamiliar interaction concepts [15] [17]. Previous work [2] suggests that some gesture commands (e.g. air tap, swipe, finger rotation) can be unfamiliar to older adults, therefore interface instructions on how to make certain gestures should be addressed carefully to avoid failed interaction attempts.…”

Movement Characteristics and Effects of GUI Design on How Older Adults Swipe in Mid-Air

“…Microsoft HoloLens, Leap Motion) and has been employed in a diverse range of applications such as interactive TV, vehicles, and public displays [9,10,13]. Research [4,11] has found that older adults (aged 60 and older) may face greater challenges when interacting through mid-air gestures due to age-related decline in motor control, limited range of motion [5] and a lack of familiarity with this novel input method [6,8,12], however this issue is far from being tackled and fully understood. A particular challenge relates to the difficulty and inconsistency of how older adults perform the swipe gesture, a highly recurrent mid-air gesture that involves a lateral swiping motion of a finger or hand, that is mostly used for menu navigation and item selection [3,15,16].…”