Effects of practice with foot- and hand-operated secondary input devices on performance of a word-processing task

Abstract

This study compared the performance of users operating a foot controlled input device (foot mouse) with that of users operating a hand controlled input device (hand trackball). Four different tasks that required (1) direct manipulation of on-screen objects and menu command activation, (2) keyboard entry and direct manipulation, (3) keyboard entry and command activation, and (4) keyboard entry, direct manipulation, and command activation were assessed. Performance on each task was measured both before and after participants practiced computing tasks with one of the devices for 750 trials. For all 4 tasks, practice improved performance with the foot mouse but not the hand trackball. However, overall performance was better with the hand trackball. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.