Compass visualizations for human-robotic interaction

ABSTRACT

Compasses have been used for centuries to express directions and are commonplace in many user interfaces; however, there has not been work in human-robotic interaction (HRI) to ascertain how different compass visualizations affect the interaction. This paper presents a HRI evaluation comparing two representative compass visualizations: top-down and in-world world-aligned. The compass visualizations were evaluated to ascertain which one provides better metric judgment accuracy, lowers workload, provides better situational awareness, is perceived as easier to use, and is preferred. Twenty-four participants completed a within-subject repeated measures experiment. The results agreed with the existing principles relating to 2D and 3D views, or projections of a three-dimensional scene, in that a top-down (2D view) compass visualization is easier to use for metric judgment tasks and a world-aligned (3D view) compass visualization yields faster performance for general navigation tasks. The implication for HRI is that the choice in compass visualization has a definite and non-trivial impact on operator performance (world-aligned was faster), situational awareness (top-down was better), and perceived ease of use (top-down was easier).

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.2 User Interfaces (D.2.2, H.1.2, I.3.6)
          Subjects: Screen design (e.g., text, graphics, color)

Additional Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.2 User Interfaces (D.2.2, H.1.2, I.3.6)
          Subjects: User-centered design; Evaluation/methodology

General Terms:
Design, Human Factors, Measurement, Performance

Keywords:
compass visualization, human-robotic interaction (hri)