This paper reports results from a controlled experiment (N = 50) measuring
effects of interruption on task completion time, error rate, annoyance,
and anxiety. The experiment used a sample of primary and peripheral
tasks representative of those often performed by users. Our experiment
differs from prior interruption experiments because it measures effects
of interrupting a user�s tasks along both performance and affective
dimensions and controls for task workload by manipulating only the
time at which peripheral tasks were displayed � between vs. during
the execution of primary tasks. Results show that when peripheral
tasks interrupt the execution of primary tasks, users require from
3% to 27% more time to complete the tasks, commit twice the number
of errors across tasks, experience
from 31% to 106% more annoyance, and experience twice the increase
in anxiety than when those same peripheral tasks are presented at
the boundary between primary tasks. An important implication of our
work is that attention-aware systems could mitigate effects of interruption
by deferring presentation of peripheral information until coarse
boundaries are reached during task execution. As our results show,
deferring presentation for a short time, i.e. just a few seconds,
can lead to a large mitigation of disruption.
%0 Journal Article
%1 BaKo06
%A Bailey, B. P.
%A Konstan, J. A.
%D 2006
%J Computers in Human Behaviour
%K context diss interruptions work
%P 685-708
%T On the need for attention-aware systems: Measuring effects of interruption
on task performance, error rate and affective state
%V 22
%X This paper reports results from a controlled experiment (N = 50) measuring
effects of interruption on task completion time, error rate, annoyance,
and anxiety. The experiment used a sample of primary and peripheral
tasks representative of those often performed by users. Our experiment
differs from prior interruption experiments because it measures effects
of interrupting a user�s tasks along both performance and affective
dimensions and controls for task workload by manipulating only the
time at which peripheral tasks were displayed � between vs. during
the execution of primary tasks. Results show that when peripheral
tasks interrupt the execution of primary tasks, users require from
3% to 27% more time to complete the tasks, commit twice the number
of errors across tasks, experience
from 31% to 106% more annoyance, and experience twice the increase
in anxiety than when those same peripheral tasks are presented at
the boundary between primary tasks. An important implication of our
work is that attention-aware systems could mitigate effects of interruption
by deferring presentation of peripheral information until coarse
boundaries are reached during task execution. As our results show,
deferring presentation for a short time, i.e. just a few seconds,
can lead to a large mitigation of disruption.
@article{BaKo06,
abstract = {This paper reports results from a controlled experiment (N = 50) measuring
effects of interruption on task completion time, error rate, annoyance,
and anxiety. The experiment used a sample of primary and peripheral
tasks representative of those often performed by users. Our experiment
differs from prior interruption experiments because it measures effects
of interrupting a user�s tasks along both performance and affective
dimensions and controls for task workload by manipulating only the
time at which peripheral tasks were displayed � between vs. during
the execution of primary tasks. Results show that when peripheral
tasks interrupt the execution of primary tasks, users require from
3% to 27% more time to complete the tasks, commit twice the number
of errors across tasks, experience
from 31% to 106% more annoyance, and experience twice the increase
in anxiety than when those same peripheral tasks are presented at
the boundary between primary tasks. An important implication of our
work is that attention-aware systems could mitigate effects of interruption
by deferring presentation of peripheral information until coarse
boundaries are reached during task execution. As our results show,
deferring presentation for a short time, i.e. just a few seconds,
can lead to a large mitigation of disruption.},
added-at = {2007-11-01T10:10:38.000+0100},
author = {Bailey, B. P. and Konstan, J. A.},
biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/2bc90d633ee917a7c7e9953215468c911/carsten},
file = {BaKo06.pdf:BaKo06.pdf:PDF},
interhash = {87b78e5dd41cdd2fe03cfdfac2acccaf},
intrahash = {bc90d633ee917a7c7e9953215468c911},
journal = {Computers in Human Behaviour},
keywords = {context diss interruptions work},
owner = {ritterskamp},
pages = {685-708},
timestamp = {2007-11-01T10:16:46.000+0100},
title = {On the need for attention-aware systems: Measuring effects of interruption
on task performance, error rate and affective state},
volume = 22,
year = 2006
}