Development and evaluation of a multimodal touchpad for advanced in-vehicle systems

Abstract

Multimodal interaction can substantially improve human-computer interaction by employing multiple perceptual channels. We report on the development and evaluation of a touchpad with auditory, tactile and visual feedback for in-vehicle applications. In a simulator study, we assessed its suitability for interacting with a menu-based on-board system and investigated the effects of uni-, bi- and trimodal feedback on task and driving performance, workload and visual distraction in comparison to a conventional rotary push-button. In summary our results show that users clearly benefit from additional non-visual feedback while driving. When using the touchpad with multimodal feedback, our subjects also reached a higher level of performance compared to the rotary push-button. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.