Hidden Costs of Graphical User Interfaces: Failure to Make the Transition from Menus and Icon Toolbars to Keyboard Shortcuts

Abstract

Graphical interfaces allow users to issue commands using pull-down menus, icon toolbars, and keyboard shortcuts. Menus and icon toolbars are easier to learn, whereas keyboard shortcuts are more efficient. It would seem natural for users to migrate from the use of easy-to-learn menu and icon methods to the more efficient method of keyboard shortcuts as they gain experience. To investigate the extent to which this transition takes place, 251 experienced users of Microsoft Word were given a questionnaire assessing their choice of methods for the most frequently occurring commands. Contrary to our expectations, most experienced users rarely used the efficient keyboard shortcuts, favoring the use of icon toolbars instead. A second study was done to verify that keyboard shortcuts are, indeed, the most efficient method. Six participants performed common commands using menu selection, icon toolbars, and keyboard shortcuts. The keyboard shortcuts were, as expected, the most efficient. We conclude that even experienced users are inefficient in their use of graphical interfaces. One possible way to improve user efficiency is for training programs to provide a roadmap for users to make the transition from using pull-down menus and clicking icon toolbars to issuing keyboard shortcuts.

Quick Pad Tagger : An Efficient Graphical User Interface for Building Annotated Corpora with Multiple Annotation Layers

“…The input method should be efficient: Both Lane et al [17] and Omanson et al [18] show that keyboard based input methods are often more efficient than mouse based input methods.…”

Training towards mastery

“…Graphical user interfaces (GUIs) support three stages of application proficiency [9]. When a novice encounters an application for the first time, she searches the menus within the interface to discover the correct item for executing the desired operation.…”

“…However, in most cases, the transition tends to breakdown before the user reaches true efficiency, with most experienced users rarely employing keyboard shortcuts and macros [9].…”

The Unadorned Desk: Exploiting the Physical Space around a Display as an Input Canvas

“…The secondary and off-screen workspace also trade-off: it is much easier to select items in the secondary space, but only a few can be held there. In contrast, a huge number of items can be held in the off-screen workspace, but it is harder to select them (or to remember accelerator methods such as keyboard shortcuts) [21]. Instead of trying to fit everything on screen (directly or through menus), we investigate using the unadorned (i.e., unchanged except for a sensing device) desk as a further space to contain artifacts.…”