Impact of Primary Tasks on Soft Shape-Change Perception on a Smartwatch
In IHM'25 - 36e Conférence Internationale Francophone sur l'Interaction Humain-Machine. 2025. to appear.
Fouad Gasmi, Zhuzhi Fan, Céline Coutrix
Abstract
Smartwatches have become integral to receiving notifications during everyday tasks, helping users stay connected, reduce anxiety about missing important information, and support their well-being. While emerging technologies offer novel notification experiences,how effectively they perform when users are engaged in primary tasks remains unclear. This study examines the notification performance of a recently developed pneumatic soft curvature-changing smartwatch. Through an experimental investigation, we measuredusers’ absolute detection threshold (ADT) for notifications while they performed cognitive and physical tasks. Results show an ADT of 5.70 psi (round curvature) and 6.22 psi (pointy curvature) during a cognitive task and an ADT of 8.07 psi (round curvature) and 10 psi (pointy curvature) during a physical task. These findings provide valuable insights for designing future shape-changing notification smartwatches to improve user experience and enhance task compatibility.