One Road: an engaging multi-touch interface within a museum context

Abstract

Interactive multi-touch screens in museums are often used for a dual purpose: to both educate and entertain visitors. With this in mind, how can the sense of ‘delight’ in the use of a multi-touch screen in a museum be explained? What kinds of ‘delight’ may visitors experience, and why? A case study was enacted in April 2012 on One Road, an interactive multi-touch installation in the ‘Yiwarra Kuju: The Canning Stock Route’ exhibition at the Australian Museum, Sydney. The study aimed to investigate user experiences of the interactive, and a range of different behaviours were observed. A discussion of the findings with reference to the concept of ‘delight’ in interface design examined how different aged visitors appeared to find ‘delight’ in different entertaining and educational features of One Road, and questioned whether entertainment-focused ‘delight’ was positive or negative. These considerations are important for interface designers. With further research, we may come to better understand and continue to investigate how an interface design on a multi-touch surface in a museum can be ‘delightful’, and influence users’ experiences.

Affiliations

The School of Design Studies

The College of Fine Arts,

University of New South Wales,

PO Box 259, Paddington, Sydney,

2021, Australia

Contributors

Melanie Touw

Brad Miller

Conference

Publication date: September 2012

Publication date (Print): September 2012

Pages: 1-4

ID: 10.14236/ewic/HCI2012.103

Copyright statement: © Melanie Touw et al. Published by BCS Learning and Development Ltd. The 26th BCS Conference on Human Computer Interaction, Birmingham, UK

License:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Conference name: The 26th BCS Conference on Human Computer Interaction

Conference acronym: HCI

Conference number: 26

Conference location: Birmingham, UK

Conference date: 12 - 14 September 2012

Conference sponsor: Electronic Workshops in Computing (eWiC)

Conference theme: Human Computer Interaction

Product

Product Information: 1477-9358 BCS Learning & Development

Self URI (article page): https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/HCI2012.103

Self URI (journal page): https://ewic.bcs.org/

Categories

Series title: Electronic Workshops in Computing