Designing salient and supportive systems for proximal behaviors.

Designers should create salient reminders and support mechanisms to help users stick to near-term plans by reducing participation costs and increasing belief in the ease of tasks.

About this paper

The author conducted two studies to understand how temporal distance affects planned behavior, finding that attitudes become more important for distant events while perceived behavior control influences intentions regardless of timing.

These findings advance the Theory of Planned Behavior and provide strategies for designers and event organizers to motivate behaviors over different timeframes.

Here are some methods used in this study:

Theory Of Planned Behavior Construal Level Theory

Which part of the paper did the design guideline come from?

“We hypothesized that people tend to have a higher intention to perform the behavior in the far future compared to near future (H5). Results of the paired-samples t-test show that the mean of willingness to attend the yoga class differs a month before the event (M=.80, SD=.41) and a few days before the event (M=.60, SD=.49) at the .01 level of significance (t=2.70, df=29, p<.01, 95% CI, for a mean difference .05 to .35, r=.62). We should point out that in the end, only 6 participants actually (...)” (‘Change in Intention Over Time’ section)

Suh, M. (Mia), & Hsieh, G. (2016). Designing for Future Behaviors. Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems.

Inspiration and scope

This paper focuses on designers and event organizers encouraging participation and adherence to plans.

Designing for individuals with disabilities who lack precise touch input to provide an accessible interface system for mobile devices based on non-touch gestures and movements. Your design focuses on accommodating disabilities and ergonomic needs, while the paper emphasizes motivating behavioral change through psychological triggers. At the same time, they both aim to create engaging experiences despite different goals. The paper retains user attention and elicits behaviors; your design ensures the interface is intuitive and easy. Reducing cognitive load and providing clear feedback are common ideas.

Also, the success metrics diverge; the paper measures success by participation rates, while yours is by usability and accessibility, like error rates and user satisfaction. At the same time, both can benefit from offering customization to meet user needs. Personalized prompts in the paper enhance participation, while your interface tailors to different disabilities. Both contexts adapt designs for diverse user profiles.

By leveraging these similarities, consider designing an accessibility interface with adaptive functionalities, reduced cognitive load, clear feedback, and customization. This makes it easier for users to interact confidently and effectively with their devices, enhancing their experience and motivation.

Your input

  • What: a new accessible interfacing system for mobile devices based on non-touch gestures/movements
  • Who: individuals with disabilities, lack of precise touch input
  • Design stage: Research, Ideation, Evaluation

Understanding users

The following user needs and pain points may apply to your design target as well:

User Engagement Through Clear Feedback

Integrating clear and immediate feedback can enhance the intuitiveness of the non-touch gesture interface. Immediate response to user actions helps in reducing cognitive load, making the system more user-friendly and engaging, especially crucial for accessibility purposes.

Customization and Personalization

Offering customization options can cater to various disabilities, making the interface adaptable to individual needs. Personalized settings ensure that the gestures/movements used for interaction are tailored to the user's capabilities, improving usability and satisfaction.

Design ideas

Consider the following components for your design:

1

Implement adaptive gesture recognition that learns and adjusts to the user's unique movement patterns over time.

2

Integrate a clear, immediate feedback system that uses simple visual and auditory cues to confirm gestures.

3

Include customization options for gesture sensitivity and allow users to select or create alternative gestures based on their capabilities.

Methods for you

Consider the following method(s) used in this paper for your design work:

Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB)

Using TPB can help understand users' intentions and guide the design of interfaces that promote positive attitudes, normative beliefs, and perceived control over non-touch-based inputs. Pay attention to specific needs and challenges of individuals with disabilities to enhance perceived behavioral control.

Construal Level Theory (CLT)

Applying CLT can assist in predicting how users might interact with accessible interfaces over different time frames. Consider the temporal distance of planned behaviors when designing to ensure that both the 'why' and 'how' of actions remain clear and motivating.

Metrics for you

Consider the following metric(s) used in this paper to evaluate your design work:

Behavioral Intent

Behavioral intent evaluates the likelihood that users will engage with the system based on their intention to use it. This metric can help determine if the accessible interface is meeting the needs of users with disabilities. Designers should keep in mind that stated intentions may not always translate to actual behavior, especially as time progresses.

Perceived Behavioral Control

Perceived behavioral control assesses how easy or difficult users believe it will be to interact with the system. This metric is crucial for understanding potential barriers that target users may face. Designers must ensure that the interface minimizes difficulties and increases users' confidence in their ability to successfully use the system.

[Figure 3] From this figure, you can gain insights on how interaction of different behavioral components could inspire ideas for designing gesture-based interactions.