Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea (대한인간공학회지)

Ergonomics Society of Korea (대한인간공학회)
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A Comparison of Usability between the Height Adjustable Keyboard and the Adaptive Touch Keyboard on Smartphones

  • Received : 2017.01.06
  • Accepted : 2017.02.23
  • Published : 2017.04.30
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Abstract

Objective: This study aims to compare the usability of the adaptive touch design method with that of the height adjustable design method that are applied to the Korean QWERTY keyboard and Naratgul keyboard on smartphones, examine the results, and present practical implications. Background: Smartphone manufacturers have failed to satisfy every user with their uniform touch keyboard designs that do not consider the high use rates of keypad use. In reality, touch keyboard designing customized for every individual is impossible, but there need to be researches on was to improve usability by having touch areas changed automatically depending on user behaviors or having users adjust the keyboard height depending on their hand size. Method: As for the design methods, an object group was given smartphones with the adaptive touch design method and the other group those with the height adjustable design method. As they entered the same characters in the smartphones, typing error rates and text input speed were measured and the average values were compared. 35 individuals who would frequently use smartphones in daily life participated in the experiment. The group variable was the type of touch keyboards, and the test variables were typing error rates and text input speed, for which a T-test was implemented. Results: As for the QWERTY keyboard, the significant improvement effect was verified as the typing error rate of the adaptive touch design method was 4.21% but that of the height adjustable design method was 3.28% although there was no significant difference in terms of text input speed. As for the Naratgul keyboard, in contrast, the typing error rate of the adaptive touch design method was 2.5% while that of the height adjustable design method was 1.48%, which indicates a measure of improvement, but the effect was not significant. On the other hand, the text input speed per minute was improved as much as 22.2%, which is significant. Conclusion: First, the Korean touch keyboard usability of the adaptive touch design method and that of the height adjustable design method, when applied to Model A of Company L, showed significant difference from each other. Second, the height adjustable design method was applied to the QWERTY keyboard, the typing error rate was improved significantly. This indicates that as the keyboard height was raised, the number of buttons within the range of fingering decreased, decreasing the touch bias was reduced. Third, the height adjustable design method was applied to the Naratgul keyboard, the text input speed was improved. Application: When the QWERTY keyboard was applied to a smartphone as small as 5.5inch or less, it is highly probably that the height adjustable design method decreases the typing error rate. It may be considered to develop additional UX functions to make the keyboard font larger or give users the option to adjust button intervals in utilization of the SW advantages of the height adjustable design method.

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References

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