Survival Analysis

Abstract

Waiting for the completion of a system process is an everyday experience. While waiting, a system provides feedback to the user about ongoing processes through temporal metaphors (Progress bar, Busy icons, etc.). One of the key performance requirements for temporal metaphors is to retain the user till the process completes. Researchers have evaluated these metaphors through subjective means, and objective assessment has not been well explored. In this paper, we present survival analysis as an objective assessment method to evaluate temporal metaphors. Through a field experiment, we demonstrate the application of survival analysis and empirically establish that auditory progress bar (a temporal metaphor for audio interfaces) works for callers of a distress helpline. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first study on distress callers. The paper further discusses the applicability of survival analysis for evaluating temporal metaphors and wait time experiments for other applications, tasks, and settings.

Snackomat - A Vending Machine To Create Positive Experiences By Bringing People In Contact And Initiating Small Talk In Waiting Situations

“…Previous research on waiting times have focused on analysing different waiting situations, reducing waiting time or improving waiting conditions (Durrande-Moreau and Usunier 1999;Nie 2000;Bournes and Mitchell 2002;Kutash and Northrop 2007;Minton 2008;Norman 2008;Zhou and Soman 2008;Ho et al 2014;Asthana et al 2015;Frank et al 2015). The goal is to avoid letting waiting time negatively influence the perception of service providing people.…”