ria@pbhyc.PacBell.COM (Rich Anderson) (03/25/88)
Let's say you were planning to introduce sophisticated workstations (each
with a mouse) to people with experience with dumb(er) terminals only.
What would you say are key steps that need to be taken to enable these
people to readily understand and effectively use a mouse?
What case/research studies or training materials exist that can be
consulted/used to facilitate transition to sophisticated equipment?
R. I. Anderson
Human Factors Analyst
Pacific Bell
2600 Camino Ramon, Room 2E850 (415)823-3715
San Ramon, CA 94583 ...{ihnp4,ames}!ptsfa!pbhyc!riaklee@daisy.UUCP (Ken Lee) (03/25/88)
In article <987@pbhyc.PacBell.COM> ria@pbhyc.PacBell.COM (Rich Anderson) writes: > >Let's say you were planning to introduce sophisticated workstations (each >with a mouse) to people with experience with dumb(er) terminals only. > >What would you say are key steps that need to be taken to enable these >people to readily understand and effectively use a mouse? > The mouse is a tool, not an end to itself. Learning to use the mouse must take place within the context of the application. Learning to use a keyboard differs quite a bit between applications that use it for text entry and applications (e.g., vi) that use it for control. Fortunately, the mouse is much simpler than the keyboard. Almost all applications use the mouse solely for pointing. This is a fairly simple spatial coordination task: move the mouse and the cursor moves with it. Any buttons on the mouse should be tied into the pointing task. More sophisticated uses for the mouse are, of course, possible, but they must lead to greater cognitive complexity. Ken
rmpinchback@dahlia.waterloo.edu (Reid M. Pinchback) (04/05/88)
In article <987@pbhyc.PacBell.COM> ria@pbhyc.PacBell.COM (Rich Anderson) writes: > >Let's say you were planning to introduce sophisticated workstations (each >with a mouse) to people with experience with dumb(er) terminals only. > >What would you say are key steps that need to be taken to enable these >people to readily understand and effectively use a mouse? > Having grown up in the batch-oriented and dumb-terminalled mainframe era, I think I understand the shift your users will experience. There is a qualitative difference to use of workstations and electro/opto-mechanical peripherals. A user can, if able to overcome psychological barriers, experience more feedback and a greater sense of control over the operations of the computer. Since the CS department here has been experimenting with various approaches to introductory material, I'll see if I can extrapolate some of the apparent results to your case. An initial battery of small, pre-programmed learning tasks seems to be very effective at initiating people into use of the new (and unfamiliar) enviroment. However, as in most educational situations, you will have a group of people that grasp the concepts very quickly, and will be bored silly... its a trade-off of sorts, but very effective for those with little or no prior background in the subject being taught. Some informal idea-hashing of the students has led us to a few ideas that can help people overcome the psychological blocks that unfamiliarity can create. As these ideas relate to your situation, you could consider two types of software that would allow people to relate their own physical movements to the process of using a mouse. The first kind of software would be that of games with a spatial orientation, such as those requiring movement of pieces on a visual board. Examples would be chess, empire, xconq. Hokey as this may sound, almost anybody will put forth the effort to learn a game when they wouldn't make even a fraction of the same effort for drier material. The task that is learned at this stage is a basic psycho-motor task. In order to accomplish a visible result (the feedback), I must learn to move the mouse in analogous ways in the physical world. With practise, I learn the association between my physical behaviour and the resultant visual behaviour of the workstation. The second kind of software would be the class of image-manipulation packages, such as painting programs, WYSIWYG editors/word processors. In other words, anything with a cut-and-paste, icon-manipulation method of interaction. This provides the person with experience of a more abstract effect from interaction with the mouse. Now the mouse has become a tool for the execution of more general operations, and I can learn the association between my physical behaviour and more complicated operations of the workstation. Having said this, these are surmises and guesses based on what we have seen in the way 1st-year students are handling unfamiliar material. I have extrapolated our concerns (learning of programming and machine concepts) to your case. >What case/research studies or training materials exist that can be >consulted/used to facilitate transition to sophisticated equipment? > Though I haven't seen studies of mouse-use per se, there are some psych- ological studies on the design of both simple and complex tools (very recent work), and a massive amount of literature on psychological resistance problems in learning computer use, particularly within a business environment. Hope this gives some ideas. Once you've come up with a course design, maybe you could post the results, let us know how well the students fared with your approach. Reid M. Pinchback -----------------
zwicky@pterodactyl.cis.ohio-state.edu (Elizabeth D. Zwicky) (04/06/88)
It's worth remembering that the motor skills and the concept may well come separately. I had no problem at all figuring out what I was supposed to do with a mouse when I was learning, but had a great deal of difficulty making it do what I wanted it to. I have no depth perception, which limited my learning of hand-eye coordination. Even once I had developed a basic ability to make the pointer go somewhere, I had further difficulties with skills like picking up a mouse to continue a motion while holding down the mouse button (as, for instance, when you run out of table before you run out of pull-down menu). Raw practice is important here, and that means a game or a drawing program; something interesting enough to keep the attention, without being a disaster when things go wrong. Elizabeth Zwicky
gilbert@cs.hw.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton) (04/07/88)
In article <951@daisy.UUCP> klee@daisy.UUCP (Ken Lee) writes: >The mouse is a tool, not an end to itself. Learning to use the mouse >must take place within the context of the application. >a keyboard differs quite a bit between applications that use it for text The mouse is not always an obvious tool. See Card, Moran and Newell chapter on input devices in the Psychology of Human-Computer Interaction (Lawrence Erlbaum). The chapter all too briefly hints at some of the problems which novices had with mice. I have observed some of them myself. Common problems are: * having the tail point towards you (hold mouse wrong way around) * treating mouse as absolute, not relative positioning device. Mouse kept on pad/confusion when mouse forced up against keyboard Can you really lift it up and put it back? * treating mouse as non-mechanical/optical device Mouse expected to work off pad/surface * difficulty in adapting to tracking behaviour, especially with software cursors. Mouse is an indirect pointing device with variable control to display ratio In a nutshell, users WILL form application independent models of mice which are wrong. A very short fact sheet will help them to develop a proper model of the mouse in question. Any human factors specialist should know enough about input devices to anticipate many of the problems. There are mnay survey papers here