Can Previews Mitigate the Effect of Interruptions? Findings from a Lab Experiment under Various Workloads

Frank John Bolton, Dov Te’eni, Eran Toch*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Human attention has become a critical resource for the effective design of smart services in which control may move back and forth between humans and computers. To avoid errors in critical conditions when the mental load is high, computer systems need to manage ongoing interruptions. In particular, the effect of interruptions can be mitigated with previews of computer-generated notifications. While previews have been used to increase engagement, research on their potential to mitigate the effect of interruptions is scarce. Using an experiment based on a game environment with varying task loads, we investigated the effect of previews on mitigating interruptions at several levels of mental load. We found interruptions that displayed previews added less to participants’ mental load but did not improve their overall performance. These results were consistent in all levels of task load. We summarize the article by discussing how previews can be designed to minimize the negative effects of interruptions.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)956-964
Number of pages9
JournalInternational Journal of Human-Computer Interaction
Volume40
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - 2024

Funding

FundersFunder number
Seventh Framework Programme264738

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