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How should Fitts' Law be applied to human-computer interaction?The paper challenges the notion that any Fitts' Law model can be applied generally to human-computer interaction, and proposes instead that applying Fitts' Law requires knowledge of the users' sequence of movements, direction of movement, and typical movement amplitudes as well as target sizes. Two experiments examined a text selection task with sequences of controlled movements (point-click and point-drag). For the point-click sequence, a Fitts' Law model that used the diagonal across the text object in the direction of pointing (rather than the horizontal extent of the text object) as the target size provided the best fit for the pointing time data, whereas for the point-drag sequence, a Fitts' Law model that used the vertical size of the text object as the target size gave the best fit. Dragging times were fitted well by Fitts' Law models that used either the vertical or horizontal size of the terminal character in the text object. Additional results of note were that pointing in the point-click sequence was consistently faster than in the point-drag sequence, and that pointing in either sequence was consistently faster than dragging. The discussion centres around the need to define task characteristics before applying Fitts' Law to an interface design or analysis, analyses of pointing and of dragging, and implications for interface design.
Document ID
20040089816
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
Authors
Gillan, D. J.
(University of Idaho Moscow 83843, United States)
Holden, K.
Adam, S.
Rudisill, M.
Magee, L.
Date Acquired
August 21, 2013
Publication Date
December 1, 1992
Publication Information
Publication: Interacting with computers
Volume: 4
Issue: 3
ISSN: 0953-5438
Subject Category
Life Sciences (General)
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other
Keywords
NASA Program Space Human Factors
NASA Discipline Space Human Factors
NASA Discipline Number 06-10
NASA Center JSC

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