Matthew Lombard, PhD BTMM, MM&C, ISPR November 8, 2007 (Tele) Presence and Usability

Overview What is (tele)presence? The growing (tele)presence field Who cares? Usability and presence Example

What Is (Tele)Presence? The evolution of media technologies - drawings, print, radio, film, television, computers, IMAX, simulator rides, virtual reality, AI agents…

What Is (Tele)Presence? … has produced mediated experiences that seem increasingly natural, intuitive, comfortable, easy, automatic, and ‘real’ because the technology seems increasingly less like technology.

“the extent to which one feels present in the mediated environment, rather than in the immediate physical environment” (Steuer, 1992) “A sense of ‘being there’ in a displayed scene or environment” (Barfield, Zeltzer, Sheridan, & Slater (1995) “the perceptual illusion of nonmediation” (Lombard & Ditton, 1997) What is (Tele)Presence?

"Presence (a shortened version of the term ‘telepresence’) is a psychological state or subjective perception in which even though part or all of an individual's current experience is generated by and/or filtered through human-made technology, part or all of the individual's perception fails to accurately acknowledge the role of the technology in the experience.” (International Society for Presence Research, 2000) What is (Tele)Presence?

Lara Diki T-babe Webbie- Tookay Virtual Characters What is (Tele)Presence?

Sony’s Aibo “From the first day you play with Aibo, it will become your new companion for the Millennium.”

What is (Tele)Presence?

Growing (Tele)P Field ISPR hosts first systematic database (n=1834)

Growing (Tele)P. Field

10 Annual International Workshops on Presence: PRESENCE 1998: Suffolk, England PRESENCE 1999: Colcester, England PRESENCE 2000: Delft, The Netherlands PRESENCE 2001: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA PRESENCE 2002: Porto, Portugal PRESENCE 2003: Aalborg, Denmark PRESENCE 2004: Valencia, Spain PRESENCE 2005: London, UK PRESENCE 2006: Cleveland, Ohio, USA PRESENCE 2007: Barcelona, Spain

Growing (Tele)P. Field

Who cares? It’s ‘central’ – relates to many fields and endeavors It will be increasingly common It has many potential effects – attention, memory, social judgment, persuasion, enjoyment, task performance… It’s just cool

Who cares? Art Business Education Entertainment Ethics … Health/Medicine Military Philosophy Politics Psychology …

Usability and Presence More presence means greater usability Make technology adapt to people, not people adapt to technology A natural, intuitive interface that hides technology  presence  usability  efficiency/productivity/satisfaction…

Usability and Presence How to evoke presence? –Big displays (high field of view) –Multiple senses (sound) –Interactivity –Obvious affordances –Perceptual and social realism –Spatial cues – you’re in a place –Social cues – you’re interacting with a person –Meet natural expectations for dealing w. ‘real’ world

Example Karl Horvath’s dissertation study: THE COMPUTER AS INFORMATION INTERMEDIARY: USING SOCIAL AND SPATIAL CUES TO EVOKE PRESENCE IN COMPUTER USERS AND OPTIMIZE HUMAN- COMPUTER INTERACTION

Example Low spatial, low social cues

Example High spatial, high social cues

Example Low spatial, high social cues

Example High spatial, low social cues

Example Results: –Social cues  Social presence –Spatial cues  Spatial presence –Social/spatial cues  Satisfaction, enjoyment, comprehension, perceived ability, likelihood of use –Social + spatial  biggest effects –For all experience levels

Example Bottom lines: (Tele)Presence looks like a useful concept for increasing usability Researchers and practitioners in both areas should talk!

For more information… Matthew Lombard