Managing Extrinsic Costs via Multimodal Natural Interaction Systems

Modern day interactions, whether between remote humans or humans and computers, involve extrinsic costs to the participants. Extrinsic costs are activities that, although unrelated to a person’s primary task, must be accomplished to complete the primary task. In this paper we provide a framework for discussing certain extrinsic costs by describing those we term over-specification, repetition, and interruption. Natural interaction systems seek to reduce or eliminate these costs by leveraging peoples’ innate communication abilities. However, in conceiving these interfaces, it’s critical to acknowledge that humans are naturally multimodal communicators, using speech, gesture, body position, gaze, writing, etc., to share information and intent. By recognizing and taking advantage of humans’ innate ability to communicate multimodally, extrinsic interaction costs can be reduced or eliminated. In this paper we review previous and ongoing work that demonstrates how multimodal interfaces can reduce extrinsic costs. Author